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1
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North Carolina Poems
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North Carolina Poems
s
SELECTED AND EDITED, WITH AN INTRODUC- /
TION, NOTES AND BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES
BY
EUGENE CLYDE BROOKS
Professor of Education in Trinity College, Durham, N. C,
and Editor of North Carolina Education
T?
published by
North Carolina Education
raleigh, n. c.
1912
/
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T
THE NEW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY |
"03500
*5?TOH, LENOX AND
1.LD.N FOUND^Jp^L m2 By E c BR0QKS
! ALL' RIGHTS RESERVED
PRESSES OF
. .••. ••• *. • \ I C **$*&. MUTUAL PUBLISHING COMPANY
•• V: : . • *• W ••*••' * RALEIGH, N. C.
• ••• • • • •
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i
/ spread to-day my humble wares in view
Of all who chance to journey past this way.
With anxious heart and trembling hand I lay
My handiwork before the false and true,
And o'er and o'er arrange it all anew;
For some will praise, now this, now that; some say
That this were better left undone, while they,
Who pass indifferently, will not be few.
—Lucille Armfteld: Songs from the Carolina Hills
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O queenly State! lift up thy fair, proud head,
The while thy sons and daughters honor thee,
And shine a pure white star, whose light shall be
Undimmed through all the ages yet to come !
—Mrs. A. W. Curtis
vi
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If we have weal, if we have woe,
If we have rights, if we have wrongs,
The world must all our feelings know —
We tell our stories in our songs.
—James Chester Rockwell
vii
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r
EDITOR'S PREFACE
North Carolina Education began in September, 1911, to
publish a series of poems by North Carolina writers. The
purpose was to reproduce for the teachers of North Caro-
lina some of the best poetry written by North Carolinians.
After running the selections in North Carolina Education
for a year, it was decided to complete the list of poems as
far as possible, and publish them in book form. We have
made selections from the earliest collections of North
Carolina verse, from newspapers, old text-books, and mag-
azines. Two previous collections have been made; Mary
Bayard Clarke's Wood Notes (two volumes), published in
1854; and Rev. Hight C. Moore's Select Poetry of North
Carolina, published in 1894.
The principal purpose of this collection is to encourage
the youth of the State to a more earnest and intelligent
study of the literature of the State. For various reasons
the students of our public schools and colleges know prac-
tically nothing of our literature. Until recently one rare-
ly heard of the study of a Southern author, to say nothing
of a North Carolina author, in our grammar schools or
high schools. But through the efforts of Professors Trent,
Smith, Mims, Paine, Weber, Stockard, and Sledd, South-
ern literature, including a few North Carolina selections,
has found its way, though slowly, into the schools of the
State.
Since the announcement of the proposed publication of
North Carolina Poems we have received numerous letters
from many persons making suggestions as to the selection
of authors and poems. These letters have been of much
assistance in leading us to material that would probably
have been overlooked. Moreover, it is quite probable that
we have overlooked certain writers who deserve to be men-
tioned in this collection. Many who once wrote entertain-
ix
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x EDITOR'S PREFACE
ingly are now almost in oblivion. Realizing this fact, we
were led to give a biographical sketch of each author in
order that the name may not entirely perish from the
earth.
The poems are arranged alphabetically by authors and
we have endeavored to give notes sufficient to make the
poems clear. But so far as possible, we have purposely
avoided giving foot-notes, preferring instead to give all
necessary notes immediately under the subject of the
poem. We do not claim supremacy for every author.
But we do believe that the teacher will find poems of
real merit in this volume and many others possessing local
significance that will give pleasure to the reader. It is
not intended that North Carolina Poems shall be made a
regular text-book. But we do believe that every school
should possess a few copies, and at the proper time the
teacher should put the book in the hands of the pupil of
about the sixth or the seventh grades, and teacher and
pupil should read the poems together. With such use in
view, the inclusion of love poems and dialect verse has
been purposely avoided.
We are indebted especially to Dr. Edwin Mims of the
University of North Carolina and Professor W. H. Wanna-
maker of Trinity College, for their assistance in selecting
many of the poems and in reading the proof, and to Mr.
Marshall DeLancey Haywood, of Ealeigh, for valuable
aid in preparation of the biographical sketches.
E. C. BROOKS.
Durham, N. C, October 20, 1912.
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CONTENTS
Introduction 1
John Henry Boner
The Light'ood Fire o
Hunting Muscadines 6
The Wanderer Back Home 7
The Wolf 8
The Moon-Loved Land 9
Poe's Cottage at Fordham 10
Herbert Hutchinson Brimley
The Mammoth 12
'Tis Springtime in the Woodlands 14
The Royal Terns of Royal Shoal 16
Baylus Cade
Waiting 18
A Jolly Old Man 20
Mary Bayard Clarke
Lines to the Old North State 23
Racing Water 26
Nixon Poindexter Clingman
In Memoriam 28
Sallie O'H. Dickson
A Greeting to Grandfather Mountain 32
Dp We Forget? 33
A Prayer 34
Plato Tracy Durham
The Bells of Trinity 35
The Dream of Lee and Lincoln . 36
North Carolina to Charles Brantley Aycock 37
The Garden of Death 38
H. S. Ellenwood
Marriage of the Sun and Moon 39
Edwin Wiley Fuller
Under the Pines 41
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xii CONTENTS
Lines to the Ladies' Memorial Association of Wil-
mington 42
The Sunflower 43
The Bells of Heaven 44
Alexander F. Gaston
The Volunteers 45
William Gaston
The Old North State 46
Pattie Williams Gee
Mater Mea, Carolina 48
God's Love 51
Joseph H. Gillespie
Stanzas 52
The "Valley and Shadow" 53
Chancellorsville 54
Charles Luther Greaves
To a Snow-Bird. 56
Minstrels of the Pasquotank 57
The Shout of a King 58
William Bernard Harrell
Ho! For Carolina! 60
Thomas Watts Harrington
Carolina, Our Pride 62
The Gander 65
To a Wood Lark 67
To a Mocking Bird 68
Marshall DeLancey Haywood
The Flint-Lock Rifle 69
Blackboard the Corsair 72
Zebulon Baird Vance 75
Theophilns Hunter Hill
Song of the Butterfly 76
The Sunbeam / • • • ? 8
The Star Above the Manger . . . 79
Joseph William Holden
Hatteras 82
Emma A. Lehman
Queen Flora's Opening Day 86
The Snow 88
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CONTENTS xiii
Marie Batterham Lindesay
Song 89
Peace 90
Johnny's Story 91
What is Worth While? 91
Samuel Harley Lyle, Jr.
A Song of Autumn 92
Morn and Eve 92
The Song of the Buccaneer 93
Where Fairies Play 94
A Song of the Road 95
Life's Victors 96
John Charles McNeill
Away Down Home 98
M. W. Ransom 99
October 100
Sunburnt Boys 101
The Open Fire 102
At Sea 103
Abraham Forest Morehead
The HillB of Dan 104
The Genius of Dan 105
James Chester Rockwell
Night 108
He Came and Went 109
The Poet's Story 109
She is My Queen 110
James Diddle Shepard
The Pilot Ill
Roanoke 113
Benjamin Sledd
The Children 115
The Mystery of the Woods 116
United 117
The Vision of the Milk-White Doe 118
The Wraith of Roanoke 119
Hersey Everett Spence
A Christmas Prayer 120
Beauty or Power 121
Paper-Folks 122
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xiv CONTENTS
Cornelia Phillips Spencer
Biographical Sketch 125
The niverBity's Centennial 126
Indian Names 127
Henry Jerome Stockard
The Last Charge at Appomattox 129
In the Lighthouse at Point Lookout, North Caro*
Una 131
The Eagle 131
A Christmas Memory 132
Washington 133
Sir Walter Raleigh 133
Robert Strange
The Music of the Heart 136
Earth's Lullaby to Her Children 137
Frances Christine Fisher Tiernan
Biographical Sketch 138
The Alabama 139
Regret 141
Unknown
Swannanoa 143
Robert Brank Vance
Biographical Sketch 146
Dr. Mitchell's Grave 147
The Mountain Cross 148
Georgia Mordecai Whiting
Warrior, Sleep! 150
Seymour Webster Whiting
Alamance 151
Song of Spring 152
Sue M. Whitaker
Finis 154
Index 157
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INTRODUCTION
"The history of literature in North Carolina/' says Dr.
C. Alphonso Smith,* "has never been written, but enough
is known to warrant the historian in calling attention to
our native writers as interpreters and moulders of our
history I have reference chiefly to North Carolina
writers who have found their inspiration in their native
soil, writers who have celebrated the scenery or perpetu-
ated the traditions of their own States. Such writers are
history makers and history interpreters, and if
the pupil learns nothing more than that literature has
from the beginning been the conservator and herald of
history, he will have learned a truth that will minister to
him as long as he lives. ' '
The purpose of this volume of poetry is to give the
schools of North Carolina an opportunity to study "North
Carolina writers who have found their inspiration in
their native soil, writers who have celebrated the scenery
or perpetuated the traditions of their own States.' ' The
greatest of these have lived and wrought almost within
this generation. However, their names are rarely heard
in the school-room and their production is seldom read
even by the teachers of the State.
To the practical man of to-day the writer of poems or
essays or novels may be of no significance a« compared
with the farmer or the merchant or the manufacturer;
and it is true that a nation is, as a rule, more practical
than poetic. But the time has passed in the history of
our country when the practical altogether predominates.
No one man and no class of men has made, or is making,
the fabric of Statehood. It is a collective and composite
♦In an address delivered before the State Literary and His-
torical Association November, 1911.
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2 INTRODUCTION
thing on which many brains have pondered and many
hands have wrought. And out of this realization there
would come that new conception of the State, a conception
which has kindled alike the imagination of the past and
the patriotism of the citizen. This truth all teachers espe-
cially should appreciate. North Carolina literature will
never flourish until more interest is taken in literature by
the people.
M. Taine says in the introduction to his History of Eng-
lish Literature: "There are few nations which through-
out their existence have thought and written in the full
sense of the word." Certainly North Carolina, and even
America, does not belong to this chosen few. Only a stray
poem here and there produced before the Civil War by
North Carolina writers has come down to us. But one of
these, "The Old North State," by Judge Gaston, is the
best known State song in America. Ellenwood's "Mar-
riage of the Sun and Moon" belongs to the first quarter
of the nineteenth century, but the author has been forgot-
ten. Nevertheless this poem has probably had a wider
circulation than any other North Carolina poem. Prob-
ably the most famous antebellum poem is Whiting's
"Alamance," which has been preserved to American liter-
ature by Burton Egbert Stevenson in his Poems of Ameri-
can History.
The Civil War changed old customs, produced new emo-
tions, and turned the currents of thought into other chan-
nels, and there has arisen in the State, as well as in the
South, a group of writers who have found a real inspira-
tion in their native soil. We do not claim supremacy for
every local writer, nor do we claim that every selection
reproduced in this volume, will live forever. But we do
believe that to select the representative writers of either
prose or poetry, to portray the salient features of their
life and work, to relate them properly to the varied activ-
ities of the State and to the ideals and interests of the
pupils in our school, will deepen and diversify the interest
of both pupil and teacher in the richer life of the State.
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INTRODUCTION 3
However, even the best of our North Carolina literature
rarely finds a way into the schools of the State. But we
do believe that every school can use many of these poems
in connection with history, geography or literature with
decided profit. For example, when the history of the first
attempt of the English to settle America is being studied,
Holden's "Hatteras," Stockard's "In the Lighthouse at
Lookout,' ' and "Sir Walter Raleigh," and Sledd's "The
Vision of the Milk-White Doe" should be read. A live
teacher can interest pupils in these selections and give
real life and meaning to what is sometimes very uninter-
esting history.
When the students are studying the Revolutionary pe-
riod, Haywood's "The Plint-Lock Rifle," Stockard's
"Washington," Whiting's "Alamance," and Clarke's
"Lines to the Old North State" will have special inter-
est. Moreover, when the pupils are studying the Civil
War period, the teacher will find the following se-
lections to be very appropriate for parallel reading:
"Durham's "The Dream of Lee and Lincoln," Fuller's
"Under the Pines" and "The Sunflower," Gee's "Mater,
Mea Carolina," Gillespie's " Chancellorsville, " Sledd's
4 * United, ' ' Stockard 's ' * The Last Charge at Appomattox, ' '
and Tiernan's "The Alabama."
There are other writers who have found their inspira-
tion in the soil and streams and mountains of North Caro-
lina, and they have produced a literature suitable to be
read in connection with North Carolina geography. Such
as Boner's "Hunting Muscadines" (on the Yadkin),
Brimley's "Mammoth," Dickson's "Greeting to Grand-
father Mountain," Mrs. Clarke's "Racing Water" (the
French Broad), "Swannanoa," Holden's "Hatteras," Mc-
Neill's "At Sea" and "Sunburnt Boys" (on Lumber
River), Morehead's "The Hills of Dan," Shepard's "The
Pilot" and "Roanoke," Spencer's "Indian Names,"
Stockard's "In the Lightouse at Point Lookout," and
Vance's "Dr. Mitchell's Grave" and "The Mountain
Cross."
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4 INTRODUCTION
In addition to these, there are poems lyric in their na-
ture that express a sentiment well worth the study by
persons more mature even than high school pupils. Such
as Boner's "The Light- 'ood Fire" and "Poe's Cottage at
Fordham," Durham's "North Carolina to Charles Brant-
ley Aycock," Hill's "Song of the Butterfly,' ' McNeill's
"Away Down Home" and "October," Sledd's "The Chil-
dren," Stockard's "The Eagle," and Miss Whitaker's
"Finis."
Emerson has finely said, speaking of the poet: "Wher-
ever snow falls, or water flows, or birds fly, wherever day
and night meet in twilight, wherever the blue heaven is
hung by clouds, or sown with stars, wherever are outlets
into celestial space, wherever is;danger, and awe, and love,
there is beauty, plenteous as rain shed for thee." When-
ever the teacher and the pupil and all lovers of literature
have the trained senses to appreciate the spirit of poetry
we may look forward to a time when writers shall make
the mountains of Western North Carolina as sacred as
those where William Tell wrought out his marvelous
deeds ; where all the beauties of landscape shall be a back-
ground for the feats of the hero; where the world may
look to the people of this State as those who prize a poem
as much as a factory, and a work of imagination more
than many mills.
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JOHN HENRY BONER
The Author. — John Henry Boner was born in Salem,
N. C, in the year 1845. He learned the printer's trade and
secured work in the United States Printing Office, Wash-
ington, D. C. It was during these days that he published
his first book of poems. The little volume was called
" Whispering Pines.' ' His best verses were of the South,
which he spoke of as "The Moon-loved Land." But of
all places, his heart turned first to the beautiful little city
in which he was born.
Soon after he had published the volume of poems he
lost his place in the United States Printing Office on ac-
count of politics. This was in the days when the civil
service law was not so widely extended. But his poems
had brought him fame. Edmund Clarence Stedman, of
New York, one of the foremost literary critics of the
times, was delighted with Boner's poetry and secured
work for him in New York. During the next few years
he worked on several very important publications. Among
them were two of the greatest dictionaries ever published
— The Century Dictionary and The Standard Dictionary.
He next became editor of one of the leading magazines
in the United States — The Literary Digest.
He was now recognized as a literary man of much
force. But his health began to fail, and finally broke
completely. He was still poor, and in order to get money
for a trip back home he published another book of poems
called "Some New Poems." He suffered greatly from
pain and poverty. Death came to him in March, 1903,
and he was buried at Salem.
THE LIGHT'OOD FIRE
When wintry days are dark and drear
And all the forest ways grow still,
When gray snow-laden clouds appear
5
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6 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Along the bleak horizon hill,
When cattle all are snugly penned
And sheep go huddling close together,
When steady streams of smoke ascend
Prom farm-house chimneys— -in such weathe*.
Give me old Carolina's own,
A great log-house, a great hearthstone,
A cheering pipe of cob or briar
And a red, leaping light 'ood fire.
When dreary day draws to a close
And all the silent land is dark,
When Boreas down the chimney blows
And sparks fly from the crackling bark,
When limbs are bent with snow or sleet
And owls hoot from the hollow tree,
With hounds asleep about your feet,
Then is the time for reverie.
Give me old Carolina's own,
A hospitable wide hearthstone,
A cheering pipe of cob or briar
And a red, rousing light 'ood fire.
HUNTING MUSCADINES
(A Memory of Boyhood)
Floating on the gentle Yadkin in an olden-time canoe.
Singing old plantation ballads- — I and charming blue-
eyed Sue —
Blue-eyed, golden tress 'd Sue.
Willows plume the shining river, and the birch a shadow
flings
Par across its dimpled bosom. Down the shore her laugh-
ter rings —
Merry, rippling laughter rings.
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JOHN HENRY BONER 7
Pendent dew-drops glitter brightly in the overhanging
vines
Laden with a luscious treasure of large purple musca-
dines —
Ripe, delicious muscadines.
Sweetest grapes that ever clustered — purple juice on
mouth and breast —
Pearly teeth and love and laughter! Fonder love was
ne'er confessed —
Sweeter lips were never pressed.
Now we row from dappled shadows underneath the tan-
gled vines
Up the sunny stream where all the radiance of the morn-
ing shines —
the purple muscadines!
Years may pass, but I can never cease to dream of blue-
eyed Sue
And the morning on the Yadkin in the olden-time canoe —
Blue-eyed, golden tress 'd Sue.
THE WANDERER BACK HOME
Back in the Old North State,
Back to the place of his birth.
Back through the pines' colonnaded gate
To the dearest spot on earth.
No sweeter joy can a star feel
When into the sky it thrills
Than the rapture that wings a Tar Heel
Come back to his native hills.
Prom coast to mountain heights
Old North Carolina lies,
A cornucopia of delights
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NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Under her summer skies,
And autumn gives rich treasure
To the overflowing horn,
Adding a juicy measure
Of grape and rye and corn.
In June a tree so fragrant
Scents the delicious air
That busiest bees grow vagrant
And doze in its blossoms fair.
" Persimmons !" the wanderer cries;
And along time's frosted track
The luscious purple fruit he spies,
And boyhood's days drift back!
With fall comes the burst of the cartridge ;
The squirrel and the rabbit are his;
Down tumbles the whirring partridge,
And the cook makes the wild duck siz ;
But for these not so much does he care,
No matter how dainty the caters;
Just seat him fair in an old splint chair
And give him 'possum and 'taters.
THE WOLF
The wolf came sniffing at my door,
But the wolf had prowled on my track before,
And his sniff, sniff, sniff at my lodge door-sill
Only made me laugh at his devilish will.
I stirred my fire and read my book,
And joyed my soul at my ingle-nook.
His sniff and his snarl were always there
But my heart was not the heart of a hare.
I cursed the beast and drove him away,
But he came with the fall of night each day,
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JOHN HENRY BONER
And his sniff, sniff, sniff the whole night through
I could hear between the winds that blew.
And the time came when I laughed no more,
But glanced with fear at my frail lodge door,
For now I knew that the wolf at bay
Sooner or later would have his way.
The Pates were three, and I was one;
About my life a net was spun ;
My soul grew faint in the deadly snare,
And the shrewd wolf knew my heart's despair.
A crash, and my door flew open wide,
My strength was not as the beast '& at my side.
That night on my hearthstone cold and bare
He licked his paw and made his lair.
THE MOON-LOVED LAND
No lovelier song was ever heard
Than the notes of the Southern mocking-bird
When leaf and blossom are wet with dew
And the wind breathes low the long night through.
music for grief! It comes like a song
Prom a voice in the stars ; and all night long
The notes flow. But you must live in the South,
Where the clear moon kisses with large cool mouth
The land she loves, in the secret of night,
To hear such music — the soul-delight
Of the Moon-Loved Land.
When gentle twilight softly closes
The door of day, and the sun-fed roses
Lavishly sweeten the air, you will hear
That wonderful song — now low — now clear —
Till the silvery moon flushed red goes down
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10 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
On silent country and sleeping town.
the lovers are fond in the groves of the South
When the large moon kisses with grand sweet mouth
The land she loves ; and love has romance
And is more than vow and wedding and dance
In the Moon-Loved Land.
POE'S COTTAGE AT POEDHAM
Note. — Fordham was formerly a village of Westchester
County, New York, but is now a part of New York City. Here
Edgar Allen Poe lived from 1846 to 1849, and the cottage in
which he lived and wrote several of his poems is now preserved
as a Poe memorial.
Here lived the soul enchanted
By melody of song ;
Here dwelt the spirit haunted
By a demoniac throng;
Here sang the lips elated;
Here grief and death were sated;
Here loved and here unmated
Was he, so frail, so strong.
Here wintry winds and cheerless
The dying firelight blew
While he whose song was peerless
Dreamed the drear midnight through,
And from dull embers chilling
Crept shadows darkly filling
The silent place, and thrilling
His fancy as they grew.
Here, with brow bared to heaven,
In starry night he stood,
With the lost star of seven
Peeling sad brotherhood.
Here in the sobbing showers
Of dark autumnal hours
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JOHN HENRY BONER 11
He heard suspected powers
Shriek through the stormy wood.
From visions of Apollo
And of Astarte 's bliss,
He gazed into the hollow
And hopeless vale of Dis;
And though earth w6re surrounded
By heaven, it still was mounded
With graves. His soul had sounded
The dolorous abyss.
Proud, mad, but not defiant,
He touched at heaven and hell.
Fate found a rare soul pliant
And rung her changes well.
Alternately his lyre,
Stranded with strings of fire,
Led earth's most happy choir
Or flashed with Israfel.
No singer of old story
Luting accustomed lays,
No harper for new glory,
No mendicant for praise,
He struck high chords and splendid,
Wherein were fiercely blended
Tones that unfinished ended
With his unfinished days.
Here through this lowly portal,
Made sacred by his name,
Unheralded immortal
The mortal went and came.
And fate that then denied him,
And envy that decried him,
And malice that belied him,
Have cenotaphed his fame.
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HERBERT HUTCHINSON BRIMLEY
The Author, — Herbert Hutchinson Brimley, a native of
England, moved to North Carolina in 1880. A nature stu-
dent by choice and training, he was appointed to the cura-
torship of the State Museum in the spring of 1895 and has
held that position ever since with increasing reputation
and usefulness. His songs have grown out of his work.
THE MAMMOTH
Note. — The recent (fall of 1909) bringing to light of Mam-
moth bones by the suction dredge Potomac, operating on the
Adams Creek section of the Inland Waterway, calls attention to
the fact that both the Mammoth and the Mastodon, huge pre-
historic elephants, formerly ranged through the coastal plains
of eastern North Carolina.
From the depths of the peat of the swamp-fed creek,
Where the great dredge eats its way,
There were brought some bones of the Mammoth vast
To the light of a modern day :
From the place where the huge beast found his rest,
In the days when the world was young,
Ere the First Man's track in the mud was made,
Or his spear to the winds was flung :
When the hairy brute, of a strength untold,
Roamed alone through the swamps and reeds ;
Razed the cane-breaks dense, tramped the gall-bush
down,
In the place where the bear now feeds.
When his long trunk rose in the quivering air,
And his tusks 'neath the moon gleamed white,
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HERBERT HUTCHINSON BRIMLEY 13
And his trumpet call through the woodlands rang
In the hush of the cool swamp night.
And an answering call to his war cry bold
Through the aisles of the wood rang shrill —
'Twas the battle cry of the Mastodon,
From the place where he drank his fill.
Fierce rivals, these, for the Woodland's Rule —
And they fought ere the night was done:
And a deep, dark pool in the cypress swamp
Made a grave for the vanquished one.
Like great freight trains, on a down-hill grade,
With the weights piled ton on ton,
Came the Mammoth vast, in his charging rush —
Came the mighty Mastodon.
And they met with a crash that the swamp-lands shook —
And the wood-folk cowered in awe;
They met like ships in a head-on clash
In their fight 'neath the Woodland Law.
And the trees went down in the conflict fierce,
And the ground was plowed and raw ;
For they fought a fight where to lose meant death —
And the thick reeds gave like straw.
Then the wound-forced screams of the huge mad beasts
Through the swamp mists rose and fell,
With their notes of rage and their notes of fear
Like the screams of the fiends in Hell.
And their tusks gored deep and their wounds gaped
wide,
And the spouting blood ran free,
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14 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Till their strength was gone, and their lives ebbed fast
As they still fought, knee to knee.
Till the vanquished died — and the victor too —
And their forms in the pool sank deep,
To be peat- wrapped there — till the great dredge brought
Their remains from their last long sleep.
'TIS SPRINGTIME IN THE WOODLANDS
'Tis Springtime in the woodlands and the trees are bud-
ding out
In green of varied shadings, and the Winter's put to rout :
The sweet, keen scents of Nature are abroad upon the air ;
The birds are singing softly and the earth is bright and
fair.
The Pines upon the hillside, they are dropping last year's
leaves ;
The sunlight glancing through them on the ground a pat-
tern weaves:
The odor of the pine sap sets the nerves athrill like wine
And from the bark is oozing fresh the healing turpentine.
The Oaks are budding slowly as if loth to start anew
Another year of growing, with the bygone years in view ;
They fear the soulless axeman when the Winter comes
again,
And all the trees are with them in their fear of vandal
men.
The Poplars are more forward than are many of the trees ;
Their flowers and leaves are moving with the rustle of the
breeze ;
Their tall and tapering columns tower high above the rest ;
They're beautiful and graceful, up from root to topmost
crest.
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HERBERT HUTCHINSON BRIMLEY 15
The Dogwood's snowy blossoms are a feature of the
woods;
An inspiration, truly, to the man of gloomy moods :
In Spring the lowly Dogwood puts the larger trees to
shame
And, beside it, other beauties of the forest seem but tame.
The Maples show their colors best when Autumn comes
around,
Though all times they are lovely to the man whose judg-
ment's sound:
The Maple is a shade tree that's to man a noble boon,
And grateful to the woodsman as the sun approaches noon.
The Birches on the creek bank, they are budding like the
rest,
Their trunks with bark all ragged and in white and yellow
drest ;
Their pole-trunks, tall and slender, are a-waving in the
wind,
And odors from their flowing sap are ever sweet and kind.
The Willows in the bottoms are a mass of shining green ;
They're not much use for timber, as their trunks are short
and lean:
But many birds among them nest and from their branches
sing—
The Willows in the bottoms are a glory in the Spring.
'Tis Springtime in the woodlands, and the woods are all
alive
With mating birds, and bees collecting honey for the hive ;
With flowing sap and blooming flowers and butterflies
a-wing ;
In Nature there is nothing fairer than the woods in Spring.
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16 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
THE ROYAL TERNS OF ROYAL SHOAL
Note. — Royal Shoal Is a small shell island in Pamlico Sound,
about ten miles northwest from Ocracoke. It belongs to the
North Carolina Audubon Society and is famous for its colonies
of nesting sea birds, the largest and handsomest of which is the
Royal Tern.
What are those airy forms a-flitting
Over the summer sea?
What is that low, dark line a-sitting
Off there under our lee?
What are those distant noises humming
Out of the vibrant air?
What is the place to which we are coming —
And will the sight be fair?
Darting and swaying and screaming —
Ever a weaving maze;
Filling the air with their clamor —
Sounding a hymn of praise :
For here's where the Royal Tern's at home
On shell-scattered isle mid ocean's foam.
Myriads treading the measure —
Measure of Fairy reel ;
Keeping the time with their wing-beats —
Laughing a joyous peal:
At all times a-flitting through airy lanes
Tn intricate lines till the daylight wanes.
Riotous, free as the ocean —
Living in harmony, all:
Lawless, yet all law-abiding —
Never a fight or brawl;
This tenement crowded thick with life
Is ever at work but never at strife.
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HERBERT HUTCHINSON BRIMLEY 17
Smaller than many a ball-room
Floor, where ten thousand nest:
Young, scattered over the islet —
Old ones for food a-quest :
For ever a-move till the sun goes down —
Industrious folk of Sea-bird Town !
Never a moment of silence,
Never a day of rest ;
Working out Life and Salvation —
Always in silver drest:
These beautiful forms of sea and air —
These silvery sea-sprites, trim and fair.
Nesting on sand-covered beaches,
Breeding among the shells;
Eggs, almost touching, in thousands,
Ringed in by ocean swells:
For this is the islet of Royal Shoal,
Not distant from far-famed Teach 's Hole.
Such are these airy forms a-flitting
Over the azure sea:
This is that low, dark line a-sitting
Once more under our lee :
These are the distant noises humming
Out of the vibrant air :
This is the place we now are leaving—
Truly the sight is fair!
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BAYLUS CADE
The Author. — Baylus Cade was born in Barbour County,
Virginia (now West Virginia), September 3, 1844, At the
age of eighteen he entered the Confederate Army and was
surrendered at Appomattox. Soon after the war he en-
tered Richmond College, where he remained three years,
leaving college in June 1869, one year short of graduation.
He labored as pastor and agent for Education and Corre-
sponding Secretary for State Missions in West Virginia
from 1869 to 1885, when he came to North Carolina as
pastor of Louisburg and Franklinton Baptist Churches.
He later served two years as Chaplain of the United States
Penitentiary at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. But when
Daniel L. Russell was elected Governor of North Carolina
he become the Governor's private secretary, serving in this
capacity three years. At present he is pastor of Boiling
Springs Baptist Church. He has written a great deal for
the daily papers of the State, and has several times filled
editorial positions upon newspapers, both in North Caro-
lina and West Virginia.
WAITING
I
A youngling thing, with open eyes,
With knowledge scant, and hungry faiths,
I used to think the clouds were wraiths,
That swept adown the azure skies,
From stars remote within the blue,
And helped the teeming mother earth
To give her flowery children birth,
And blest them with the falling dew.
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BAYLUS CADE 19
II
But older now, with dimming eyes,
With knowledge more, and lesser faiths,
I know the clouds were never wraiths,
But earthly vapors that arise,
And flee away, to come again,
As prosy forces, trite and old,
Of inter-acting heat and cold —
Mechanics of the dew and rain.
Ill
But youngling thoughts were not untrue;
In spite of wisdom's wise old saws,
Of this, and that, from nature 's laws,
I know the all-surrounding Blue —
Instinct with Uncreated Power,
That loveth much and beauty brings —
Is brooding close to living things,
To make the man and paint the flower.
IV
So, here I sit, a gray old man,
And smile and doze, without a fear,
And dream of scmgs I cannot hear,
And wait for His unwinding Plan,
To still the din of crowding strife,
And win me clear of misty things,
And catch me up on mounting wings,
And bear me onward into Life.
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20 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
A JOLLY OLD MAN
I'm a Jolly Old Man!— I'm a Jolly Old Man!
With my face to the future, my back to the past ;
With the sun dipping low and the night coming fast—
I will sigh if I must, but I'll laugh all I can,
For the thitherward ledge,
Of the deepening night,
Is the hitherward edge,
Of the conquering light,
That is sweeping around with the lovingest plan,
To dispel all the mists that are hovering gray.
And reveal me the glint of the upclimbing way
And embathe me in splendors of Orient day —
All because I'm a waiting —
And Jolly Old Man !
There are children that own me, their grizzled old Sire !
I am living in them, I am living anew ;
I am living life larger; I'm living more true,
In those children of Soul ! — In those children of Fire ! —
O, there's triumph of Right,
There is ruin of Wrong!
O, there's growing of Light,
There is pealing of Song;
For 'tis certain that evil is under a ban —
That our knowledge enlarges 1 ; that feeling grows sane,
That our pleasure is waxing through tapering pain;
That a kingdom of Manfulness cometh amain,
To enfold me and keep me —
A Jolly Old Man I
There are children away from my touch and my sight ! —
He hath taken them on to the Amaranth Hills;
And they wander with Him by the silvery rills,
That go leaping and flashing through pinnacled light !
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BAYLUS CADE 21
There's fulfillment for them
That is promise to me;
And the tides I must stem,
Of the darkening sea,
They have safely swept over and shine in the van,
Of a countless array on the hills of the Blest ;
And they waft me a signal of loving behest,
To be done with my sorrows and finish my quest,.
And come over and join them —
A Jolly Old Man!
There is standing here now by the chimney 's wide space,
A sweet Woman with silver spun into her hair;
She's been comrade of mine through the foul and the
fair,
And the nearness of God is alight in her face !
She was lovely at morn,
She is saintly at eve;
She is ripening corn,
For the Reapers to Sheave ;
When she lovingly turns my gray features to scan,
I forget all of conflict and bickering strife,
And my soul goes aflame to my blanching Old Wife,
Who hath given the best of her fullness of life,
To inspire me and make me —
A Jolly Old Man!
It hath sometimes been hard to take life as it came ;
For its moods were severe and its shadows were dense,
And myself, and some others, have wanted in sense
To adjust our desert to the slope of our claim ;
But we've seen that the shade
Is the child of the shine ;
That commended upgrade
From the top is decline;
That the blustering years of this life's little span,
Are purveyors of good through the portals of ill ;
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22 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
That the way to the high is forever uphill ;
That the brooding control of the One gracious Will,
Is just smoothing the way for —
A Jolly Old Man!
As the light falls aslant and the night settles down,
There is wafting to me a faint tremor of tone,
Come estray from the chaunting around the White
Throne,
Where is clashing of cymbal and flashing of crown !
So, admonished of change
From the good to the best —
Prom a limited range
To a limitless quest,
I will wave a goodspeed to earth's weltering clan,
And detaching myself from these hampering ills,
And unstopping dull ears to the music that thrills,
And inclining my face to the far-away Hills,
I will bid you Good-Night, sirs —
A Jolly Old Man!
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MARY BAYARD CLARKE
The Author. — Mary Bayard Clarke was born in Raleigh,
N. C., about 1830. She was the daughter of Thomas P.
Devereux and married Col. William J. Clarke, who distin-
guished himself in the Mexican War and commanded a
North Carolina regiment during the Civil War. The fam-
ily lived in Cuba and Texas a while. But at the outbreak
of the war they returned to Raleigh.
Mary Bayard Clarke was a woman of unusual brilliancy.
She wrote both prose and poetry, and at the close of the
war resorted to her pen as a means of livelihood. In
1854 she published a collection of North Carolina verse
under the title " Wood-Notes.' ' On her return from Cuba
in 1855 she wrote "Reminiscences of Cuba'* for the South-
ern Literary Messenger. She published many graceful
poems, sometimes under the pen-name of "Tenella," some-
tims as Mrs. W. J. Clarke, and sometimes as Mary Bayard
Clarke.
One volume of poems called "Mosses From a Rolling
Stone; or, Idle Moments of a Busy Woman,' ' was pub-
lished and sold for the benefit of the fund for a cemetery
in Winchester, Va.
Among the poems written by her are "Battle of Manas-
sas," "Battle of Hampton Roads," and other war lyrics.
She wrote many poems and contributed many stories
to literary magazines. She was for a time associate ed-
itor of Literary Pastime, a weekly journal printed in
Richmond.
LINES TO THE OLD NORTH STATE
Not©. — The author here recalls the patriotism of North
Carolina soldiers in the Revolutionary War, but laments the
fact that so many North Carolinians are leaving the State and
lending their talents to the building of other States. There
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24 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
was a period of our history from 1830 to 1840 when the exodus
to other States was so great that North Carolina ceased to grow
in population. Note the reference to the Mecklenburg Declara-
tion, the Revolutionary War, Kings Mountain, and Guilford
Court House.
All hail to thee, thou good old State, the noblest of the
band,
Who raised the flag of liberty in this our native land!
All hail to thee ! thy worthy sons were first to spurn the
yoke;
The tyrant 's fetters from their hands at Mecklenburg they
broke.
No coward foresight they possessed, on peril's brink to
pause,
Nor waited for a sister State to lead in freedom's cause.
"Our lives, our fortunes," was the cry, "our honors and
our all,
We lay upon our country's shrine, in answer to her call."
From every heart there rose a shout, "No longer will we
lie
Submissive at the tyrant's feet: we'll conquer or we'll
die;
For freedom and our liberties we'll brave proud Eng-
land's host!"
King's Mount and Guilford prove it was no idle braggart's
boast.
There England found a worthy foe her far-famed steel
had met;
Firm as a rock our fathers stood and cross 'd the bayonet ;
Locked in the fierce embrace of steel they bravely met
their death,
Each bore his foeman to the ground, then yielded up his
breath.
Ye sons of Carolina, I bid you, in her name,
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MARY BAYARD CLARKE 25
Devote your time and talents to retrieve her tarnished
fame.
Ye are scatter 'd through the Union, and, by your sterling
worth,
Are enriching every State save that which gave you birth.
Whatever your condition, wherever you are found,
In the ranks of the mechanic, or as tillers of the ground,
Among the learn 'd professions, in the legislative hall,
As sailors or as soldiers, ye excel in each and all.
For steady perseverance, for honesty and truth,
The sons of Carolina are famous from their youth.
Then why desert those mountains where first your ardent
soul
Flashed forth the fire of genius unfetter 'd by control?
Why leave her peaceful bosom, her rich and fertile soil,
To seek an El Dorado, for gold to dig and toil!
Ah ! deep beneath her surface she hideth many an ore,
Rich gold as pure as Ophir or California's shore.
I tell you ye are wanting in the noble pride of State,
Or you would not thus desert her and leave her desolate.
Ye youth of Carolina, I call upon you now
To add one single jewel to the crown upon her brow.
You are entering, from her college, the battlefields of life,
And her fostering care has arm *d you right nobly for the
strife ;
Walk onward, then, to glory; seek literary fame,
And with the pen of history write Carolina 's name.
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26 , NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
RACING WATER
Note. — The name of the French Broad River in the Chero-
kee language was "Tah-kee-os-tee," signifying "racing water."
It is said, however, that the French made a trip from the Ohio
valley into Western North Carolina and gave it the present
name. Hot Springs, in Madison County, is located near the
French Broad.
Racing Water, who can paint thee,
With thy scenery wild and grand?
It would take a magic pencil
Guided by a master hand.
Here are towering, rugged mountains,
Granite rocks all scarred and gray,
Nature 's altars whence her incense
Floats in wreaths of mist away.
At thy feet the murmuring waters
Now are singing songs of praise,
Or in sonorous notes triumphant
A majestic paean raise.
Down the canyon's rocky gorges
Now they wildly, madly sweep,
As, with laughing shout exultant,
O'er the rocks they joyous leap.
Then in calm and limpid beauty
Still and deep they silent flow,
With the verdant banks o'erhanging
Pictured in the depths below.
Pulsing from the heart of Nature,
Here thy "Hot Spring's" genial gush,
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MARY BAYARD CLARKE 27
There, like stream from Alpine glacier,
Down the mountains coldly rush.
Tah-kee-os-tee — Racing Water —
Was thy sonorous Indian name,
But as "French Broad* ' thou art written
On the white man's roll of fame.
Perish that — but live the other!
For on every dancing wave
Evermore is shown the beauty
Of the name the red man gave.
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NIXON POINDEXTER OLINOMAN
The Author — Nixon Poindexter Clingman was born at
Huntsville, N. C, November 1, 1847. His grandfather was
Rev. Henry Patillo, of Granville County, who was a dele-
gate to the first Provincial Congress and chaplain of that
body. He was likewise a cousin of General Thomas L.
Clingman who served this State in the United States Sen-
ate. During the Civil War he lived at the home of his
brother-in-law, Colonel Lotte W. Humphrey, in Onslow
County, to be a protection to his sister while Colonel Hum-
phrey followed the Stars and Bars. While defending his
sister's home he was captured by Federal soldiers, but,
escaping from his captors, he made his way to Golds-
boro, N. C, where he lived the remainder of his days.
Here he studied law, but soon drifted into newspaper
work, and it was to the columns of the Goldsboro Messen-
ger that he contributed the most of his verse. He died
July 12, 1885, and was buried in Goldsboro. After his
death his friends published "A Poet and His Songs,"
which contains his poems and a sketch of his life.
IN MEMORIAM
Land of the South ! embalmed in song
That echoes down the years,
Above thy dead to-day we strew
The victor Bay and burial Yew,
To tell thy fame in tears :
For tho ' thy starry cross went down
Amid the wrathful fight,
Upon its shining wreck we read
How hero hearts can break and bleed,
Before they yield the right.
Land of the South ! the sweet May-time
That wooes thy buds and blooms,
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j NIXON POINDEXTER CLINGMAN 29
Doth in its flight adown the Spring
Its rosy garlands freely bring
To wreathe thy place of tombs,
Where lowly winds like mourners bend
To whisper to the brave,
Whose quiet brows, tho ' cold beneath,
Are circled with the laurel 's wreath
That sparkles from the grave.
Land of the South ! thy blades no more
Leap out in hands of steel,
But in their rust the record sleeps
That jealous Homer steadfast keeps,
How Southrons scorn to kneel ;
And on thy deeds shall Romance love
To rear her dazzling fane,
And pilgrims come to haunt the urns
Where Sorrow broods and Valor turns
To muse upon thy slain.
Land of the South ! the stars that burst
Like blossoms from thy sky,
Reflect in each a hero 's shade
Whose knightly deeds shall only fade
When Time itself shall die ;
And future Bards shall sweetly wake
To thee their chosen lyre,
And woman's lips shall hymn the praise
To childish ears in tender lays
Of fallen Southern sire.
Land of the South ! a Bayard keeps
All mute his marble rest,
Within each grave whose storied clay
Lies in its winding sheet of grey
Upon thy mother breast;
And now we bring our floral gifts,
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30 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
And braids of Immortelle,
As tribute to the courtly dead
Who followed where thy banner led,
And with that banner fell.
Land of the South ! thy squadrons rush
Down in the fray no more,
'Mid rifle flash and sabre stroke
And scenes of blood and battle smoke,
As in the days of yore,
But, ah ! the lightning track they left
Is paved with Spartan dust,
And legends linger where they rode,
That gild the page of Valor's Code,
Of how they kept their trust.
Land of the South ! a halo gleams
Upon thy midnight gloom,
And 'round thy broken shrine it throws
A wreath of light that constant glows
About the martyr's tomb,
And from the darkest ruins spring,
Where life and hope are dumb,
Traditions that shall live in song
That other Minstrels shall prolong
In days that are to come.
Land of the South ! about thy wrecks
The fires of Courage play,
And Glory gathers from thy grief
The grandest gleanings in its sheaf
To garner them for aye ;
For when the last throb of thy drums
Grew faint upon the air,
Immortals bore on wings of flame
The echo up the steeps of Fame
And left it living there.
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NIXON POINDEXTER CLINGMAN 31
Land of the South ! no martial muse
A purer theme shall teach
Than how thy colors swift and far
Swept o 'er the purple field of war
And lit the deadly breach :
And Vandal pen can ne'er profane,
Or blight with venom stroke,
A single star that hung thereon
And shone till every hope was gone
To dare the despot 's yoke.
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SALLIE OH. DIOESON
The Author. — Sallie O'H. Dickson, the daughter of a
Presbyterian minister, was born in Charleston, S. C. She
was educated in Charleston and Orangeburg, S. C, Female
College. For some years she taught music, English, and
art. But for the last twelve years she has devoted her
time to literature, making her home in Winston-Salem.
She writes especially for children and young people, hav-
ing published several books for their use. She has pub-
lished also a booklet of "Poems" from which the selec-
tions reproduced below are taken. She usually writes
over the pen name of "0. H."
A GREETING TO GRANDFATHER MOUNTAIN
Note. — Grandfather Mountain, in Western North Carolina, is
the highest elevation of the Blue Ridge. The Roan, a range
of the Alleghany Mountains, separating North Carolina from
Tennessee, is 6,313 feet high. Mount Mitchell is the highest
peak east of the Rocky Mountains. Its altitude is 6,711 feet.
O patriarch of the hills, thou sleepest well,
Wrapt in thy regal robes of deepest blue,
With sunset clouds for canopy! The spell
Of thy majestic silence rests once more
Upon my spirit, and I gladly yield
The homage of a loyal, loving heart.
Ah ! I have seen old Pisgah, crowned with clouds,
"Stand up and take the morning"; I have watched
The rosy dawn blush into beauty rare
From the famed summit of the mighty Roan ;
Have stood on Mitchell 's tow 'ring heights and seen
A hundred mountains break in billows blue
Against his awful foot; but still I turn
And yield to thee the palm ! Thou art my king !
For something sure there is of kingly power,
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SALLIE O'H. DICKSON 3
Of a mysterious majesty, that dwells
With thee. It calms and soothes th* unquiet heart,
And whispers, "Thou art safe! For as about
Jerusalem the mountains are, so God
Is with His people evermore."
Ah! know
There is a subtle power that needs not words, —
An eloquence more deep than human speech;
Beneath its sway the soul grows strong in faith
And in serener trust. It feels afresh
Th' eternal safety of that happy man
Who puts his trust in the eternal God !
DO WE FORGET 1
Do we forget when winter snows lie deep
Above the beds where our beloved sleep,
And we no longer wildly weep, —
Do we forget 1
Because, when comes the holy Christmas tide,
And love and joy are scattered far and wide,
We check our sighs, and strive our tears to hide-
Do we forget?
Do we forget, because, with mute lips pressed
To fading pictures, all our love, unguessed,
Lies locked secure within our patient breast —
Do we forget 1
Because, across the widening gulf of years,
There comes no loving word to quell our fears,
No watchful hand to brush away our tears, —
Do we forget?
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34 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Do we forget? Nay, in each heart there lies
A secret place, where, hid from mortal eyes,
Dwells, strong and true, a love that never dies,
Nor can forget!
A PRAYER
See how the splendor of the sunset sky doth glow
In the small windows of the village church below!
Grant, Lord, that in the windows of our souls may shine
Such reflex beauty from Thy life of love divine!
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PLATO TRACY DURHAM
The Author. — Plato Tracy Durham, the author of the
following poems, was horn in Shelby, September 10, 1873.
He was prepared for college at Horner's Military School
and graduated at Trinity College, Durham, N. C, in 1895.
After leaving Trinity College he attended the Yale Divin-
ity School, Union Theological Seminary, and Oxford
(England) University. In 1899 he was elected Professor
of Biblical Literature and Church History in Trinity Col-
lege, which position he filled for seven years. At present
he is the Presiding Elder of the Winston District of the
M. E. Church, South.
THE BELLS OF TRINITY
Note. — This poem was read at Trinity College on July 22,
1911, when the large new bell was hung to replace the old
college bell that was destroyed by. fire. The date was the fif-
tieth birthday of ex-President (now Bishop) John C. Kilgo,
and in honor of him the bell was named "Marse Jack."
When weary on the storm-swept hills
I hush the climber's challenge song,
And love the dreamy light that fills,
The lotus-blooming vales of Wrong,
A warning song rings out to me —
The deep, stern bells of Trinity.
When bleeding on the battlefield
Where Bight's uplifting banners go,
My coward soul would cry, "I yield,"
And bend before the ancient foe,
A bugle song enheartens me —
The clear, brave bells of Trinity.
r When standing where the bravest die
And scorning Falsehood's hissing whips,
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36 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
I dare to own my soul and cry
The Truth, e'en though with bleeding lips,
A song of triumph rings to me —
The proud, free bells of Trinity.
When kneeling desolate and lone
Within the ancient garden dim,
I pay the price to them unknown
Who have not dared to watch with Him,
A benediction breathes to me —
The sweet, grave bells of Trinity.
When far my pathway lies along
The moorland of the after years,
When life sings low her evening song
And all the west a glory wears,
Then ring your vesper song to me,
sunset bells of Trinity.
THE DREAM OP LEE AND LINCOLN
Note. — A bill providing for the erection of Lee's statue in
the Capitol at Washington was before Congress. A certain
Western Senator in opposing the bill made a very bitter speech
against thus honoring Lee. It had no effect, however, on the
Senate. This poem was in answer to that speech. It was first
published in the Charlotte Observer, later in The Outlook, and
in other papers of the country.
The years have wrought their miracle : America is one ;
The dream of Lee and Lincoln, out of light and shadow
spun,
Has come to long fulfillment and their shining task is done.
Our dead are not forgotten ; we keep vigil o 'er their dust.
We sing their deeds in deathless song and hold their
fame a trust
Till Time, the final judge, shall write a judgment that is
just.
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PLATO TRACY DURHAM 37
But America, our mother of the sorrow-chastened soul,
Has called and we are coming from the years of bitter
dole,
" Forgiving and forgiven" writ across the darkened scroll.
And to her field of battle where the light and night oppose,
Where wrong and right are marshalling their lines of
ancient foes,
We follow where America's out-streaming banner goes.
And marching to the star-sown flag this song of war we
sing :
' ' The sword of Lee to battle for America we bring,
And Jackson's rankers answer where her far-blown bugles
ring.
And when upon that battlefield the victory is thine,
When high above the death of Wrong thy blazoned stars
shall shine,
Look thou for us, America, along the foremost line."
NORTH CAROLINA TO CHARLES BRANTLEY
AYCOCK
Note. — Charles Brantley Aycock, North Carolina's "Educa-
tional Governor," was born in Wayne County, November 1,
1859. He was elected Governor in 1900; and after a brilliant
career he died in Birmingham, Ala., April 4, 1912, while ad-
dressing the Alabama Teachers' Assembly. He spent the
greater part of his life trying to improve the educational con-
ditions of North Carolina. This poem was published a few
days after his death.
Come rest within my mother-arms, my son;
The night has come ; the day's long work is done :
So nobly done that I shall stand to keep
An endless vigil o'er thy mortal sleep.
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38 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
For thou didst know my need, my bitter dole ;
Didst catch the vision of my greater soul,
And all the love of thy brave spirit give
To make that shining prophet-vision live.
For me thy soul was as a banner flung ;
A morning bugle was thy golden tongue,
Whose ringing challenge to the reign of Night
Led on my Dawn's embattled hosts of light.
So long as my own sovereign name is known,
As shines my star upon the flag star-sown,
Thy name shall live a deathless memory,
An heir to mine own immortality.
When marble monument and brazen bust
Shall crumble back again to formless dust
Thy name, deep-graved in love's unfailing art,
Shall still be written on my children's heart.
THE GARDEN OF DEATH
Gray hills are lifting in the west,
Old with the years of God ;
Where youth so eagerly ascends
Millennial feet have trod.
The ancient sea along the east
Old in primordial years,
Still luring with her wander-song,
Is salt with ageless tears.
In ancient gardens of Desire
Still blows the rose of lust ;
Look well. Beneath your eager feet
Millennial hearts are dust.
\
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H. S. ELLENWOOD
The Author. — Little is known of the author of this
poem. He was a Northern man who came to North Caro-
lina between 1820 and 1830 and taught school at Hills-
boro. He wrote several poems that attracted immediate
attention.
MAERIAGB OF THE SUN AND MOON
Note.*— The "Marriage of the Sun and the Moon" is a beauti-
ful allegory describing an annual eclipse. It first appeared in
the Raleigh Register many years before the Civil War and was
copied in almost every journal of the Union.
Do you know that a wedding has happened on high,
And who were the parties united?
'Twas the Sun and the Moon ! In the halls of the sky
They were joined and our continent witness 'd the tie —
No continent else was invited.
Their courtship was tedious, for seldom they met
Tete-a-tete, while long centuries glided,
But the warmth of his love she could hardly forget,
For, though distant afar, he could smile on her yet,
Save when earth the fond couple divided.
But why so prolix the courtship! and why
So long was postponed their connection?
That the bridegroom was anxious 'twere vain to deny,
Since the heat of his passion pervaded the sky;
But the bride was renown 'd for reflection.
Besides, 'tis reported their friends were all vexed;
The match was deemed, somehow, unequal;
And when bid to the wedding, each made some pretext
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40 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
To decline, till the lovers, worn out and perplex 'd,
Were compeird to elope in the sequel.
Mars and Jupiter never such business could bear,
So they haughtily kept themselves from it ;
Herschell dwelt at such distance that he could not be
there ;
Saturn sent, with reluctance, his ring to the fair,
By the hands of a trustworthy Comet.
Only one dim, pale Planet, of Planets the least,
Condescended the nuptials to honor;
And that seemed like skulking away to the East:
Some assert that it was Mercury acting as priest,
Some Venus a-peeping — shame on her !
Earth in silence rejoiced, as the bridegroom and bride
In their mutual embraces would linger;
Whilst careering through regions of light at his side,
She displayed the bright ring, not "a world too wide"
For a conjugal pledge, on her finger.
Henceforth shall these orbs, to all husbands and wives,
Shine as patterns of duty reflected;
All her splendor and glory from him she derives,
And she shows to the world the kindness He gives
Is faithfully prized and reflected.
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EDWIN WILEY FULLER
The Author. — Edwin W. Puller was born in Louisburg,
N. C, November 30, 1847. At the age of seventeen he en-
tered the University of North Carolina where he remained
two years. In 1867 he entered the University of Virginia,
and in the following year received diplomas in the Schools
of English and Moral Philosophy. There was an interval
of one year between his leaving the University of North
Carolina and his entrance to the University of Virginia.
During this period he wrote "Sea Gift," a novel of un-
usual popularity. During his college life in Virginia * i The
Angel in the Cloud" was written and published in the
University magazine. This poem was published in book
form in 1871 and attracted complimentary notices from
the New York Times, the St. Louis Advocate, and from
other papers of the country. It has passed through six
editions, having recently been re-published. Many other
poems were published by him. He died at the old home-
stead in Louisburg April 22, 1876.
UNDER THE PINES
("Tell them to bury me under the pines at home," from
"Sea Gift")
Note. — The author refers to North Carolina as the "Land
of the Pines." It was already known as the "Tar Heel State."
The incidents mentioned here refer, of course, to the Civil War.
In fact, the three following poems refer to the conflict between
the North and South.
I would not rest in the mouldering tomb
Of the grim church-yard, where ivy twines,
But make me a grave in the forest's gloom,
Where the breezes wave like a soldier's plume,
Each dark-green bough of the dear old pines.
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42 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Where the lights and shadows softly merge,
And the sun-flakes sift through the netted vines ;
Where the sea-winds, sad with the sob of the surge,
From the Harp-leaves sweep a solemn dirge,
For the dead beneath the sorrowing pines.
When the winter's icy fingers sow
The mound with jewels till it shines,
And cowled in hoods of glistering snow,
Like white-veiled sisters bending low,
Bow, sorrowing, the silent pines.
While others fought for cities proud,
For fertile plains and wealth of mines,
I breathed the sulphurous battle-cloud,
I bared my breast, and took my shroud,
For the land where waved the grand old pines.
Though comrades sighed and loved ones wept
For the form down in the battle-lines,
In my grave of blood I gladly sleep,
If the life I gave will help to keep
The Vandal's foot from the Land of Pines.
The Vandal 's foot hath pressed our sod,
His heel hath crushed our sacred pines ;
And bowing 'neath the chastening rod,
We lift our hearts and hands to Go#,
And cry, "Oh, save our Land of Pines !"
LINES TO THE LADIES' MEMORIAL ASSOCIATION
OF WILMINGTON
Thou who in the war-stained years
Saw our heroes' life-blood shed,
Consecrate our flowers and tears
Incense to our memorial dead.
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EDWIN WILEY FULLER 43
Love we them more tenderly
Since their hallowed death was vain,
Though they fought so manfully,
Those they left still wear the chain.
Ask them not about success,
Hear they only duty's call;
In the mortal march they press,
Bravely charge, and bravely fall.
THE SUNFLOWER
Note. — General James Johnston Pettigrew was a North Caro-
lina soldier in the Civil War who won fame in the battle of
Gettysburg, where he was killed.
When poets cull memorial flowers,
With which our martyrs' graves to strew,
They choose no one in Nature's bowers
For Pettigrew.
Yet there is one, and only one,
Which truly represents his name ;
A flower that revels in the sun,
And drinks his flame.
A flower, that opens when, all red,
The sun hath kissed the eastern skies ;
But westward turned, it droops its head
And proudly dies.
i
Thus when the sun of victory sheared
Its gory way o'er clouds of war,
This flower's tow 'ring crest appeared
A beacon star.
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44 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
And in its gorgeous, glorious rays,
This flower basked, and only bowed
When coming conquest's bloody haze
That sun did shroud.
Crushed flower, with thy broken stem,
111 keep thee near to typify
The fallen form; the hero's fame
Can never die.
THE BELLS OF HEAVEN
How long and loud their booming thunder
Rends the golden air asunder,
While the ransomed, passing under,
Fall in praise beneath the bells,
Whose mighty throbbing welcome tells:
And the Angels hush their harps in wonder —
Bells of Heaven, glory booming bells !
Gentler now, the silver's shiver
Purls the rippling waves that quiver
Through the ether's tide forever,
Mellow as they left the bells,
Whose softening vibrate welcome tells:
And the quavers play adown the river —
Bells of Heaven, softly sobbing bells!
Then the dreamy cadence dying
Sings as soft as zephyrs sighing;
Faintest echoes cease replying
To the murmur of the bells,
Whose stilling tremor welcome tells,
Faintly as the snow-flakes falling, lying —
Bells of Heaven, dreamy, murmuring bells !
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ALEXANDER F. GASTON
Note. — These two stanzas are taken from the poem, "The
Volunteers" of Alexander Gaston, son of Judge William Gaston.
It was written in honor of our volunteers in the war with
Mexico.
THE VOLUNTEERS
They are gathering, they are gathering
From the cabin and the hall,
The rifle leaves its bracket,
And the steed must quit its stall.
The country sends its thousands
And the city pours its throng,
To resent their Country's insult,
To avenge their Country's wrong.
They are gathering, they are gathering
From mountain and from plain,
Resolved in heart, of purpose high,
A bold and fearless train.
No forceful mandate calls them out,
No despot bids them go;
They obey the freeman's impulse
But to strike the freeman's blow.
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WILLIAM GASTON
The Author. — Judge William Gaston was one of the
most distinguished men of America in his day and gen-
eration. He was born in New Bern, September 19, 1778.
When he was only three years old his father, an officer
in the Revolution, was shot down in the presence of his
family. William's mother was a Roman Catholic, and
when he was thirteen he was sent to Georgetown Univer-
sity. He was the first student to enter this institution,
and to-day the main hall is named in his honor. Later he
entered Princeton College where he graduated.
He studied law and was admitted to the bar at the age
of twenty. The year after he became of age he was
elected Senator from his native county. He was twice
Speaker of the House. He became a member of Congress
in 1813, and Webster pronounced him the first man in
Congress. He was a great lawyer, and in 1833 became
Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of North Carolina.
It is said that he did more than any other one man to
make North Carolina respected and beloved by its citi-
zens. He died in Raleigh, January 23, 1844.
THE OLD NORTH STATE
Note. — It was during the Whig Convention, August 5-6,
1840, that Judge Gaston wrote "The Old North State." The
Convention assembled in open air on the west side of the Capi-
tol. Some foreign minstrel produced an air that was so beautiful
and pleasing to the Convention that the ladies present desired
appropriate words for it. To gratify them and the children of
General J. F. Taylor, Judge Gaston wrote the words given be-
low on the night of August 5th. On the next day when the
Convention assembled the song was sung to the air that had
been played the day before.
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WILLIAM GASTON 47
Carolina! Carolina! Heaven's blessings attend her!
While we live we will cherish, protect and defend her ;
Though the scorner may sneer at and witlings defame her,
Our hearts swell with gladness whenever we name her.
Hurrah! Hurrah! the Old North State forever!
Hurrah ! Hurrah ! the good Old North State !
Though she envies not others their merited glory,
Say, whose name stands the foremost in Liberty's story!
Though too true to herself e 'er to crouch to oppression,
Who can yield to just rule more loyal submission?
Plain and artless her sons, but whose doors open faster
At the knock of a stranger, or the tale of disaster?
How like to the rudeness of their dear native mountains,
With rich ore in their bosoms and life in their fountains.
And hei? daughters, the Queen of the Forest resembling —
So graceful, so constant, yet to gentlest breath trembling ;
And true lightwood at heart, let the match be applied
them,
How they kindle and flame ! Oh ! none know but who 've
tried them.
Then let all who love us, love the land that we live in
(As happy a region as on this side of Heaven) ,
Where Plenty and Freedom, Love and Peace smile be-
fore us,
Raise aloud, raise together, the heart-thrilling chorus!
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PATTDS WILLIAMS GEE
The Author. — Pattie Williams Gee was born in Halifax
County, North Carolina, March 10, 1867. Her father, Dr.
Charles James Gee, was a surgeon in the army of Northern
Virginia, he being a member of the First North Carolina
State Troops. She lived with her maternal grandmother,
Mrs. Prank P. Haywood, until Mrs. Haywood's death,
after which she came to the home of her aunt, Mrs.
Richard C. Badger, of Raleigh, N. C, under whose care
she grew to womanhood. She received her education at
St. Mary's School, Raleigh, and at Packard's Business
College of New York. After completing her education
she was employed in various lines of special work, some-
times living in North Carolina and sometimes in New
York. In 1905, however, she ceased to do steady work
and made her home at Hasbrouck Heights, New Jersey.
She recently made her home in Raleigh, N. C. ; but later
she moved to South Bethlehem, Pa., where her life was
given up to religious work. She is the inventor of the
Medallion Genealogical Register, which has been patented
in America and Europe. In 1905 she issued a small vol-
ume of forty poems entitled, "The Palace of the Heart,"
which attracted the attention of lovers of genuine poetry.
The Boston Transcript, the New York Times, and other
leading dailies made complimentary mention of the vol-
ume. A Newark paper said: "Unquestionably the finest
poem in the volume is ' Mater Mea, Carolina,' wherein the
part played by North Carolina men in the Civil War is
commemorated. ' '
MATER MEA, CAROLINA
Mater Mea, Carolina,
my Mother, Carolina,
I have seen the world 's confines
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PATTIE WILLIAMS GEE 49
And grown weary with its visions;
Sooth me with thy sighing pines.
Shield me with thy mighty mountains
While I lean upon that breast
Where the prodigal and heart-sick
Ever find a welcome rest.
Then, in accents low and tender ;
Lead my soul to regions vast ;
Open wide those gates of splendor
Where the great Confederate passed.
Ah, I know, though late seceding,
Thou wast foremost of them all;
That his veins thy blood was coursing,
Who was first to bleed and fall.
When Fate's thrilling bugle summoned,
Leaving home and youthful joys,
Up rose a hundred thousand men
And twenty thousand beardless boys.
Not in all the ancient ages,
Nor in modern wars' alarms,
Has a patriot State or Nation
Answered thus a call to arms!
I can see them as they gathered
Prom the west and from the coast,
Pressing on to Bethel's triumph,
Vanguard of the Southern host !
For thy honor and the hearthstones
Of the loved and the revered,
These, my Mother, calm, reluctant
Dared to fight and no man feared.
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50 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
'Twas thy son, Carolina,
Who that matchless flag unfurled,
Sailing out upon the ocean,
Wrapped a glory round the world !
And at Gettysburg, undaunted
By its blood and booming shell,
Pettigrew and his immortals
Plunged into the mouth of hell !
Once alone I felt thee falter,
Once I mutely turned my head,
Lest I see thee bowed in anguish
Over forty thousand, dead.
Yet at mournful Appomattox
Thou didst take thy last sad stand,
Thou, a mater dolorosa
Unto half that haggard band.
And since that dark day in springtime,
When a nation's sun went down,
Mater Mea, Carolina,
my Mother, Carolina,
Thou hast borne a noble patience,
Greater than thy war's renown 1
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PATTIE WILLIAMS GEE 51
GOD'S LOVE
The mist which o'er the morning
Casts a mantle gray and pale
Will be lifted by the sunshine
As a woman lifts her veil ;
And those solemn sweeping shadows,
Falling on life's lonely way,
Give us promise of the dawning
Of that fairer, gladder day,
When the voiceless loves of mortals,
Sad hearts winnowed by the rod,
Shall at last find full fruition
In the holy heart of God!
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JOSEPH H. GILLESPIE
The Author. — Joseph H. Gillespie was born in Duplin
County April 5, 1861. His circumstances and feeble health
did not allow him to make attainments commensurate
with his ambition. The entire time he was in school was
less than four years.
He was licensed to preach by the Missionary Baptist
Church at the age of twenty-three, and served two
churches as pastor for one year, but was forced to re-
linquish his work, having realized that he was a victim of
consumption.
During the spring of 1888 he spent ten days at Wake
Forest College, in order to receive instruction in versifica-
tion. During the following summer he carefully revised
all his poems, hoping to live to see the work of his pen in
the hands of the public. A part of the edition was re-
ceived by him December 21, 1888, but his means were too
limited and his end too near for him to see his work in
the hands of his fellows. His life slowly ebbed away until
its close February 27, 1889. A volume, entitled "Elsinore
and Other Poems,' ' was published after his death.
STANZAS
The clouds that fill the earth with gloom
Make Spring-time bright with bud and bloom,
And crown with fruits and social cheer
The golden season of the year.
Then why at destiny complain
When sorrow, like the clouds and rain,
In God's appointed time may prove
Man's richest blessings from above!
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JOSEPH H. GILLESPIE 53
THE "VALLEY AND SHADOW "
Somewhere there's a shadowy valley ,-
Men call it the valley of Death
And tell of the horrors that haunt it
"With quick and laboring breath.
But I have dwelt in the valley
Through long and painful years,
And I know its ghosts are illusions
Begot of sinful fears.
For through the mists of the valley
Rise lofty, snowy walls,
And a friendly voice in the distance
To the weary pilgrim calls.
And I turn my eyes from the valley
To the hill-tops far away,
And I see the towers of Zion
In the light of endless day.
And I know that when the valley
And its shadows shall be past
A home beyond the valley
Awaits my soul at last.
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54 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
CHANCBLLORSVILLE
Note. — The battle of Chancellorsville was fought on the 2nd
and 3rd of May, 1863. "Stonewall" Jackson was mortally
wounded in this battle. His last words were: "Let us cross
o'er the river and rest under the shade of the trees."
The foe in confusion was flying
Prom the scene of the terrible fray,
While wounded, bleeding and dying
The invincible Stonewall lay.
Yet still, in fancy, he was leading
His legion after the fight,
At God's holy altar was pleading
For aid in the cause of the right.
But the arrows were gone from the quiver,
The cup was drained to the lees,
As he cried, "Let us cross o'er the river
And rest under the shade of the trees !"
None heard the rush of the waters,
None heard the plash of the oar,
But the leader forever departed,
And the army wept by the shore.
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JOSEPH H. GILLESPIE 55
EVENTIDE
At eventide the lengthening shades foretell
The sun's decline and day's swift coming close ;
So by my waning strength I know full well
That night is near, — the end of all life's woes.
Not like a child, who, ere he goes to rest,
Doth lay aside his toys with many a tear,
But like a reaper, believing all is best,
I lay aside the arms I may no longer bear.
Not knowing what will be the recompense
Of all my deeds before the Judge of all,
I lay me down, trusting that Providence
That pities even the humble sparrow's fall.
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CHARLES LUTHER GREAVES
The Author. — Charles Luther Greaves was born June
12, 1872, in Pasquotank County, son of Mary True-
blood and Jehu Wescott Graves. He was reared on the
farm and attended the public schools. Prepared for
college at Bethel Hill Institute, in Person County, he grad-
uated at Wake Forest College in the class of 1897 and at
the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, Ky.,
in 1906. His pastorates have been in North Carolina, Ken-
tucky, and Georgia, his present home being at Hawkins-
ville, Ga. His " Lines to a Snow-bird' ' were first pub-
lished in 1904, when they attracted attention and were
widely copied. "The Minstrels of the Pasquotank* ' first
appeared in Uncle Remus 's Home Magazine for August,
1912, to which the compiler is indebted for permission to
re-publish here. "The Shout of a King" was first pub-
lished in 1907.
TO A SNOW-BIRD
Thou fleet, frail voyager of the scowling sky,
Thy heavens swept by storms, thy earth so cold,
Thou art too small with venturous wings to try
Mid surging gusts thy devious course to hold :
What charm doth keep thee here when stronger forms
Have sped in screaming haste before these storms?
A sparrow's form, an eagle's heart is thine,
Small wings, but strong and sure mid perils stern,
Not honied ease, where tropic suns do shine,
Can win thee from these frost-bound hills to turn ;
Thy being tuned to its wild melody,
The storm is dearer than the calm to thee.
Oh, surely kindly heaven has made thee know
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CHARLES LUTHER GREAVES 57
That secret taught by Him of Galilee,
To comfort timorous men long years ago ;
That He who rules creation thinks of thee,
Through eddying snow doth heed thy chirping call,
And when confused and weary marks thy fall.
Thou small, true knight upon my window ledge,
Teach me to love the storm like thee, to keep
Myself from sunny ease, to hold the pledge
Of heaven sure while tempests round me sweep ;
So in my heart shall summer's calm warmth cheer
The bitter winter of life's strenuous year.
MINSTRELS OP THE PASQUOTANK
Away down yonder on the Pasquotank,
Where the bull-frogs jump from bank to bank,
And the tide moves slow mid the cypress knees,
And the pools are dark 'neath the arching trees ;
How well I remember when the frogs are jolly,
Their deep bass calls and thunderous volley,
When the water creeps cool 'neath the matted roots,
1 Down under the roots, down under the roots/ *
And the river moves quiet and happy and deep,
Moves " happy and deep, knee-deep, knee-deep."
Away down yonder on the Pasquotank,
Where the flags are thick and the mosses dank,
When lulls the roar of the bull-frog band
The small frogs pipe on every hand,
And a million shrill throats sing of herrings,
Of " herrings, herrings, herrings, herrings,"
And of bacon, "fry-bacon, fry-bacon, fry-bacon,"
Pray what can they know about herrings and bacon !
And yet as a child I learned for true,
That is what they sing the whole night through !
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58 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Ah, wild, plebeian, boisterous frogs,
Your piping all night in the reeking bogs
Was melody sweet to my infant ear;
For softer notes 'twas not tuned to hear,
Like Philomel 's on his sprig of holly,
But the bold frogs songs that are hearty and jolly.
Where all join in with a right good will,
And the big frogs roar and the little frogs trill,
And make the night merry along the bank
Of the shimmering, gloomy, old Pasquotank.
Ye wee frog-folk of the Pasquotank,
May your race dwell long on its reedy bank,
May you chant always the same old notes,
In the same white vests and bright green coats,
May you always sing ' ( fry-bacon, fry-bacon, ' '
The song of plenty, of herrings and bacon ;
May the tide creep cool 'neath the matted roots,
"Down under the roots, down under the roots,"
And the stream move quiet and happy and deep,
Move "happy and deep, knee-deep, knee-deep."
THE SHOUT OP A KING
("The shout of a king is among them," — Num. 23:21)
Here's to the masterful man,
The stout heart that prevails ;
Here's to the man who can,
The lord of him who fails.
Here's to the pulse that's strong,
The hand of might and right,
The soul that hurls along
The red blast of the fight !
Here's to the captain's shout,
The king's voice in the host,
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CHARLES LUTHER GREAVES 59
The onset and the rout,
Proof of the strong man's boast.
The rabble becomes the state,
The mob the serried band,
When kings shout in the gate
And great souls wake the land.
For never, since time began,
Came any glorious thing
Without a mighty man,
The strong cry of a king.
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WILLIAM BERNARD HARRELL
The Author. — William Bernard Harrell was born De-
cember 17, 1823, in Suffolk, Va. After graduating at
Randolph-Macon College, he became a practicing phy-
sician. His activities as a Christian worker resulted in
a revival at Snow Hill, N. C, out of which grew a Bap-
tist church which desired him as pastor; and thus, as his
biographer says, he "was in the active work of the min-
istry before he knew it." After an active ministry of
forty years or more, he died in Dunn, N. C, November
25, 1906, three days after the death of his wife, who had
been his help-meet for fifty-six years. Says the biogra-
pher just quoted: "Both of them were gifted musicians.
In a number of cases the husband would compose the hymn
or song and the wife the melody, and then they would
sing it together. • • • • • The best known of these
productions is perhaps the patriotic song, 'Ho! for Caro-
lina,' which will perpetuate these worthy names to the
school children of the Old North State for ages to come."
HO! FOR CAROLINA!
Let no heart in sorrow weep other days ;
Let no idle dreamer tell in melting lays
Of the merry meetings in the rosy bowers ;
For there is no land on earth like this fair land of ours !
Chorus.
Ho ! for Carolina ! that's the land for me ;
In her happy borders roam the brave and free ;
And her bright-eyed daughters none can fairer be ;
Oh ! it is a land of love and sweet liberty !
Down in Carolina grows the lofty pine,
And her groves and forests bear the scented vine ;
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WILLIAM BERNARD HARRELL 61
Here are peaceful homes, too, nestling 'mid the flowers.
Oh ! there is no land on earth like this fair land of ours !
Ho ! for Carolina ! etc.
Come to Carolina in the summer-time,
When the luscious fruits are hanging in their prime,
And the maidens singing in the leafy bowers;
Oh ! there is no land on earth like this fair land of ours !
Ho ! for Carolina ! etc.
Then, for Carolina, brave and free, and strong,
Sound the meed of praises "in story and in song"
From her fertile vales and lofty granite towers,
For there is no land on earth like this fair land of ours !
Ho ! for Carolina ! etc.
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THOMAS WATTS HARRINGTON
The Author. — Thomas Watts Harrington was born Sep-
tember 5, 1849, in a portion of Cumberland County that
is now Harnett, and has spent all his life on the farm.
He is of English and Scotch ancestry. The maternal an-
cestors of himself and of his father came from Scotland.
His education was received in the common schools of the
time, his schools days ending in 1867. But having "a
pair of good eyes and an abundant supply of pine knots,"
he kept up his reading and study to good advantage. He
was elected a member of the House of Representatives
from Harnett in 1886 and 1902 and of the Senate in 1906.
He was elected on the County Board of Education in 1900
and served two years; chosen again in 1909, he is still
an active member of the Board. Mr. Harrington's pub-
lished verses have appeared mainly in the newspapers,
but the most of his productions are still unpublished.
"Carolina, Our Pride," was composed and spoken in a
warm political campaign to offset the effect of Scott's
"Breathes there a man with soul so dead," with which
Mr. Harrington's opponent was wont to close his speeches.
Mr. Harrington won in the election. "The Gander" was
written more than a quarter of a century ago for a little
son of the poet to recite on the closing day of his school.
It has been recited by many a little boy since that day,
and is likely to be recited by many more, for it possesses
the not too common merit of being true to nature. ' ' The
two bird-lyrics just bubbled up out of a plowboy's nature-
loving heart.
CAROLINA, OUR PRIDE
Carolina, the pride of my bosom
Carolina, the land of the free,
Carolina, the land of my fathers,
Carolina, my song is of thee.
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THOMAS WATTS HARRINGTON 63
From Mitchell, the pride of the mountains,
To Hatteras, the dread of the sea,
The sunshine of liberty gladdens
And tyranny trembles at thee.
Her honor is high as the summit
Of Mitchell, her loftiest peak,
Her vigor is that of the Roman,
Her spirit is that of the Greek.
Her daughters are bright as the sunshine
That lightens the hills of the west,
And fair as the rose of the valley
That blushes and blooms on her breast.
On her vine-clad sands of the ocean,
Where Manteo greeted the whites,
Were laid the first aches of empire
And freedom looked down from its heights.
She felt the first tread of the Angle
And Saxon to people this land,
Tho' rude was the welcome she gave them,
And rough the fierce gale on her strand.
What tho' the grim hand of disaster
Swept over the island and sea;
There's ever a charm in the story
That tells of a Raleigh for me.
In mystery deep and unfathomed
And dark as the depths of the sea,
More mute than the symbols of Egypt
Is "Croatan" carved on a tree.
On her shore by the sweep of the billow,
Where the sea gulls mingle their cries,
The babe of the Angle and Saxon
First opened her innocent eyes,
And saw the foundations of empire,
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64 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Surpassing the grandeur of Rome,
Now spanned by arches of glory,
A wonder for ages to come.
Away with the ruthless insulter
Her honor would sully and stain ;
The stone that the builders rejected
Is the beauty and strength of her. fane.
She was first in the battle for freedom,
First to close tyranny's gates,
First in the heart of her children,
A pillar of cloud in the States.
From the lakes of the North she has battled
Wherever her captains have led;
To the gates of the Montezumas,
She numbers by thousands her dead.
Sublime as her martial glory
She asks an unending release,
That the shouts of her soldiers forever
Be hushed in the anthems of peace.
The east and the west are united
By bands of iron and steel,
And doctors of progress, excited,
Her pulse are beginning to feel.
Hamlets are springing like magic,
The deserts beginning to bloom.
The " strip of land south of Virginia"
Is humming with spindle and loom.
Then forward and upward our motto,
And never look backward or stop,
The base of the summit tho' crowded
Is never so full at the top.
Hurrah! Carolina, forever,
A glorious destiny waits
Carolina, the cradle of freedom,
The noblest of all the great States.
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THOMAS WATTS HARRINGTON 65
THE GANDER
A gander is a noisy fowl,
And very fond of strife;
The oldest goose that's in the flock
He's sure to make his wife.
His feet are very broad and flat,
His neck is long and slim,
And when he pokes it out at me,
I'm sure to run from him.
In springtime he is very fierce —
A real fractious pest —
He will not let me go about
His dear companion's nest.
There's like a sentinel on guard,
Hell stand from morn till night,
And stretch his neck and hiss and squall
And flap his pinions white.
He helps the old goose build her nest
Of all the trash in sight,
And gets in now and then himself
To see it's finished right.
Well pleased, he stands around the nest
On one foot half the day,
And pulls the feathers off the hens
That dare to go that way.
And when the goslings are hatched out,
His little flock don't bother,
And if I see him come this way,
I'm sure to go the other.
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«0 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
A woman can out-talk a man,
In anger or in fun;
A gander can out-talk a goose,
And beat her two to one.
He gabs so fast in telling how
He whipp'd some saucy hen,
The old goose only gets a word
In edgeways now and then.
And then he '11 get in such a glee
To tell the news intent,
The old goose gives up in despair
And merely nods assent.
Now sometimes little boys and girls
Break their dear teachers' rule,
And come with smutty hands and face
And soil their books at school.
A gander is a cleanly fowl
(Although he's very mean) ;
If he has access to a brook,
Hell keep his feathers clean.
In that regard, my little friends,
I raise a flag of truce,
And bid you lay aside your wit
And emulate a goose.
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THOMAS WATTS HARRINGTON 67
TO A WOOD LARK
bonnie bird with speckled breast,
I've listened to your singing;
Let not my presence once arrest
Your song so sweetly ringing.
And 111 recline upon my plow,
A listener pleased and willing;
While you sit on yon topmost bough,
Your morning descant trilling.
While through the whisp'ring pines the sun
Beams clear in golden splendor,
You've both my heart and favor won,
And 111 attention render.
Pate spare you and your summer brood
To live and hold dominion
O'er waving field and shady wood,
To exercise your pinion.
Oh, that I were as free as you
To spend the day at leisure!
1 have a heart as light, 'tis true,
But fewer days for pleasure.
Alas! I see you've spread your wing
To fly to yonder bower;
Return to-morrow morn and sing
The dew is on the flower.
I thank you for your serenade,
My feathered friend and neighbor;
You've flown to yonder glen of shade,
And left the bard to labor.
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68 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
TO A MOCKING BIRD
Wizard of song of all the choir,
With skillful touch, th' aerial lyre
Yields unto thee its varied strain
Of carols sweet;
And every song thou'st ever heard
Was ever sung by any bird,
In waving field or shady lane ;
Thou canst repeat.
little blithesome king of birds,
Thou hast the music and the words
The poor old thrush essayed to sing,
But could not stay ;
His song you so much better sung,
And clearer spoke his mother-tongue,
I see he's stretched his whirring wing
To fly away.
The vaunted trill of nightingales,
Whose notes arise when evening pales
In dulcet strain in summer time,
I've never heard;
But when I wish for varied song,
In springtime gay or summer long,
I'd rather hear the king of chime,
The mocking bird.
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MARSHALL DeLANCEY HAYWOOD
The Author. — Marshall DeLancey Haywood was born
March 6, 1871, in the house where he now resides, on land
purchased by his grandfather soon after Raleigh was laid
out. His paternal ancestors lived in Edgecombe and Hali-
fax Counties in Colonial and Revolutionary days. Mr.
Haywood was educated in the public schools and at the
Raleigh Male Academy, also studying history for one ses-
sion (1900-1901) at Johns Hopkins University. In 1901-
1902 he was Assistant State Librarian, and Librarian of
the A. & M. College, 1902-1903. He is General Historian
of the Sons of the Revolution and Secretary of that
Society in North Carolina, Secretary of the North Caro-
lina Society of the Cincinnati, Historian of the Masonic
Grand Lodge, Historiographer of the Episcopal Church in
the Diocese of North Carolina, and Associate Editor of the
Biographical History of North Carolina, to which he has
contributed upwards of one hundred and twenty-five
sketches, mostly Colonial and Revolutionary. He is au-
thor of two volumes : a biography of Governor Tryon and
Lives of the Bishops of North Carolina, besides numerous
pamphlets, magazine articles, and verses relative to State
history. His private library of North Carolina historical
and poetical works is one of the largest and most com-
plete in the State.
THE FLINT-LOCK RIFLE
A TALE OP THE FIRST WHIG VICTORY OP THE REVOLUTION AT MOORE'S
CREEK BRIDGE, NORTH CAROLINA, PEBRUARY 27, 1776.
Note. — These verses give a historically correct account of the
battle of Moore's Creek Bridge. Colonel Donald McLeod (pro-
nounced McCloud) led the ' Highlanders in battle, and fell
pierced by more than twenty bullets. His commanding officer,
General Donald McDonald, was prevented by sickness from par-
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70 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
ticipating in the battle, but was later made prisoner. Only
one American (John Grady) was killed at Moore's Creek.
A rifle on my chimney hung
With lock of flint and steel —
A piece whose summons sharp had rung
Beside the cannon's peal
When patriots for freedom fought,
When waved their blades in air
Around the homes their sires had sought
'Mid Indian forests fair.
Within an arm-chair's warm embrace
In weariness I lay
Before a cheerful fireplace
Which drove dull care away;
Then, gazing on the weapon grim,
I thought upon the past,
Nor recked I that my blaze grew dim,
And wintry was the blast.
And now, it seems, in vision clear,
Another scene I see —
In comes an ancient pioneer
And doffs his cap to me ;
Around the room he casts his eyes
Till on the gun they fall,
And then, unheeding my surprise,
He lifts it from the wall.
"In spirit-land I long have dwelt,"
He thus his tale began,
"And in the silent hours have felt
So far remote from man
That o'er the earth my eyes were cast
To find some token old
And fate rewards my search at last
With this dear prize I hold.
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MARSHALL, DeLANCEY HAYWOOD 71
*'This rifle true, now owned by you,
Was once my pride and trust,
It heard the red man's fierce halloo,
And dashed him to the dust ;
In peace, it filled my board with game,
• In war, it played its part,
And when the Tories charging came
It found their leader's heart.
"Recalling now the years long dead,
Methinks again I hear
McDonald's Highland legions tread
The pathway to Cape Pear ;
A winding creek they soon behold,
Spanned by a bridge of pine,
Where, like the Spartan host of old,
Stands drawn our battle line.
' 'King George and broadswords!' fierce and loud
Next rings their slogan call,
As the great chieftain, brave McLeod,
Comes rushing to his fall;
Yet onward still, with charge and cheer,
His clansmen press the fight,
As paladins, unknown to fear,
With claymores long and bright.
"The bridge was long, with planks uptorn,
The stream ran swift below,
Yet quick to dare this hope forlorn,
Pressed forward still our foe;
Before our rifles' deadly crack
Full brave they made a stand,
But faltered on the narrow track
Ere they had gained the land.
"Then, drenched with blood, they onward bore,
While still was spared them breath,
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72 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
And fell our fatal guns before —
Unconquered still in death !
Thus darkly closed that deadly fray
And Freedom's sun uprose,
To shine on happier scenes to-day
When vanquished are our foes."
The pioneer thus closed his tale,
Assumed a martial tread,
And pausing there, so tall and pale,
Thus solemnly he said:
4 'When other foes our country smite,
And she's cast down with doubt,
I'll bring this rifle to the fight
And help to drive them out."
Then waving me a fond adieu,
My guest no longer spoke,
His presence faded out of view —
And slowly I awoke !
Upon the chimney once again
Was seen the hunter's friend,
My fire in ashes long had lain
And night was at an end.
BLACKBEARD THE CORSAIR
BEING AN ACCOUNT OF THE MATRIMONIAL AND PIRATICAL EXPLOITS OF
A NOTED NAVIGATOR.
Xote. — This noted pirate is said to have had the number of
wives indicated in the second stanza; but the number of
daughters and little boys is given in "poetic figures." Other-
wise this entertaining tale, so full of stirring action and vi-
vacious humor, may be taken as a historically accurate account
of the final undoing of Blackbeard.
On the coast of Carolina,
In the dim and distant past,
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MARSHALL DeLANCEY HAYWOOD 73
Lived a gay and fearless pirate,
Who could weather any blast;
And all the ladies madly loved
This buccaneer so bold,
Who wore a gorgeous uniform
With epaulets of gold.
He had thirteen loving spouses
To share his earthly joys,
He had several hundred daughters
And ninety little boys;
And when -within the nursery
These brats began to cry,
He'd start out on a voyage —
In a ship he didn't buy.
He raised his sable standard
Beside the Spanish Main,
Then scuttled twenty galleons,
And started north again;
In bleak New England's waters
He rode before the gale,
And for the coast of Africa
Put forth his dreaded sail.
Along the sands of Guinea
He went in search of gold,
And came off with some natives
Stored snugly in his hold;
When he was home again, he said,
He'd sell his human goods
To planters on the Albemarle
In Carolina's woods.
Then he returned to Ocracoke,
And, as he looked around,
He thought he saw two merchant ships
Come sailing through the sound;
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74 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
"We'll take these now," the corsair said,
"And soon will have them plundered,"
But, as he spoke these careless words,
Two crashing broadsides thundered!
What he had thought were merchants ships,
Like drones without a sting,
Were sloops of war from Hampton Roads
Sent out by England's King!
They shot the pirate's sails to shreds,
They slaughtered all his crew,
They made his boat a floating wreck,
And cut his neck in two.
High on a mast his head they kept —
A warning sad and dire ! —
While all his little children wept
To lose their noble sire;
And all his winsome widows, too,
With grief would nearly choke
When thinking of their lover true
Who died in Ocracoke.
So now, my friends, to end this lay,
A moral let me press —
Don't act as did this rover gay
And marry to excess;
For wives galore engender strife,
And you mil have to roam,
Or pass away your weary life
With squalling babes at home.
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MARSHALL DeLANCEY HAYWOOD 75
ZEBULON BAIRD VANCE
Never did Fame record a name
From falsehood's taint more free;
Never did sinful earth give birth
To son more brave than he.
In peace, he was a leader sage,
In war, a soldier true ;
No secret strife he waged in life,
His actions all men knew.
No ill-got treasure stained his hands,
No selfish ends he sought;
God send our State such men again —
Men who can ne'er be bought!
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THEOPHILUS HUNTER HILL
The Author. — Theophilus Hunter Hill was born near
Raleigh, in Wake County, October 31, 1836. One of his
grandfathers was a soldier in the American army dur-
ing the Revolution and another served as chaplain in the
army of George Washington. In 1853 the subject of this
sketch became editor of a paper published in Raleigh call-
ed The Spirit of the Age. While editing this paper he
studied law and in 1858 was admitted to practice. A
literary life, however, was more to his liking. He there-
fore gave up the law and from 1871 to 1872 he was State
Librarian. Later he became editor of The Century, a
paper published in South Carolina.
Theophilus Hunter Hill was a pure nature lover, and
his poems are best when his subjects are drawn from
the woods and fields. His poems are contained in three
small volumes. The first was published in Raleigh in
1861 and was called ' 'Hesper and Other Poems/' It was
the first book published under the copyright law of the
Confederate States. His second book was simply called
" Poems' ' and was published in New York in 1869. His
third book contains his best poems. It was called " Pas-
sion Flower and Other Poems,' ' and was published in
Raleigh in 1883. The rest of his life was devoted to liter-
ary work. He died in Raleigh June 29, 1901.
SONG OF THE BUTTERLY
"Who is merrier than It"
Quoth the golden Butterfly ;
"In the shining court of May,
Whose apparel half so gay?
I reflect each sparkling hue
Of her radiant retinue;
I have kissed the lily's cheek;
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THEOPHILUS HUNTER HILL 77
I have played at 'hide and seek,'
Veiled Violet, with you !
Who is merrier than IV
Quoth the golden Butterfly.
"I have flirted, too, with thee,
Tremulous Anemone !
And the blue-eyed pimpernel,
And the Canterbury-bell
Are superlatively blest,
Should I, for a moment, rest
Down in yonder glassy dell :
Little do they dream that I
From their soft caresses fly
But to breathe the rare perfume
Of the pale Magnolia bloom;
Or to spend a listless hour,
In the cool, secluded bower
Of the pining Passion Flower !
Blither wooer, who than I?"
Quoth the gallant Butterfly.
"When the shades of evening fall,
Like the folding of a pall;
When the dew is on the flowers,
And the mute, unconscious Hours
Still pursue their noiseless flight
Through the dreamy realms of night ,
How delightful to recline
On this crimson couch of mine !
Zephyrs, languid with perfume,
Gently rock my cradle-bloom ;
Glittering host of fire-flies
Guard my slumbers from surprise,
And Diana's starry train,
Sweetly scintillant again,
Never sleep while I repose
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78 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
On the petals of the rose !
Who hath balmier bed than I?"
Quoth the brilliant Butterfly.
"Life is but a Summer day,
Gliding goldenly away;
Winter comes, alas ! too soon, —
Would it were forever June !
Yet, though brief my flight may be,
Pun and frolic still for me !
When the sisterhood of flowers,
Having had their gala day,
In the chill autumnal showers,
Sorrowfully fade away, —
Doomed to darkness and decay,—
Who would not prefer to die —
What were life to such as IT'
Quoth the flaunting Butterfly.
THE SUNBEAM
Thing of beauty! brightly beaming.
Softly through my lattice streaming,
To my spirit thou dost seem
Like "a sweet thought in a dream* ' -
Linger yet a little while;
Still my loneliness beguile!
Brilliant sunbeam! thou dost bring
On thy gleaming golden wing,
Life and gladness, light and love,
Prom the firmament above;
Thou dost change the morning mist
Into sparkling amethyst!
Messenger from realms of light !
Thou art beautiful and bright :
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THEOPHILUS HUNTER HILL 79
How resplendent then is He,
Sunbeam, who created thee, —
Called thee from chaotic night, —
Bade thee sparkle in His sight?
Shining harbinger of Spring !
Earth, for thee, is blossoming;
At the earliest "peep of dawn,"
In the woodland, on the lawn,
Songs of welcome may be heard, —
Matins of the mocking-bird.
Welcome, bright, celestial ray!
Where thou dwellest it is day ;
When thou wanderest afar,
When I hail the evening star,
Then, sweet Sunbeam, I shall see
But a burning type of thee !
THE STAR ABOVE THE MANGER
"And lo, the star which they saw in the East, went before
them till it came and stood over where the child was!" — Mat-
thew, 7:9.
One night, while lowly shepherd swains
Their fleecy charge attended,
A light shone o'er Judea's plains
Unutterably splendid.
Par in the dusky Orient,
A star, unknown in story,
Arose to flood the firmament,
With more than morning glory.
The clustering constellations, erst
So gloriously gleaming,
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80 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Waned, when its sudden splendor burst
Upon their paler beaming :
And Heaven drew nearer Earth that night,-
Plung wide its pearly portals —
Sent forth, from all its realms of light,
Its radiant immortals:
They hovered in the golden air,
Their golden censers swinging,
And woke the drowsy shepherds there
With their seraphic singing.
Tet Earth, on this her gala night,
No jubilee was keeping;
She lay, unconscious of the light,
In silent beauty sleeping, —
She lay entranced, her Ethiop breast,
So long with anguish heaving,
The earnest of eternal rest, —
The Christ of God receiving.
No more shall brightest cherubim,
And stateliest archangels,
Symphonious, sing such choral hymn, —
Proclaim so sweet evangels:
No more appear that star at eve,
Though glimpses of its glory
Are seen by those who still believe
The shepherds' simple story.
In faith's clear firmament afar, —
To Unbelief a stranger, —
Forever glows the golden star
That stood above the manger. •
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THEOPUILUS HUNTER HILL 81
Age after ago jnay roll away,
But on Time's rapid river
The light of its celestial ray
Shall never cease to quiver.
Frail barges, on the swelling tide,
Are drifting with the ages;
The skies grow dark, — around each bark
A howling tempest rages!
Pale with affright, lost helmsmen steer,
While creaking timbers shiver;
The breakers roar, — grim Death is near, —
who may now deliver!
Light, — light from the Heraldic Star
Breaks brightly o'er the billow;
The storm, rebuked, is fled afar,
The pilgrim seeks his pillow.
Lost, — lost, indeed, his heart must be, —
His way how dark with danger, —
Whose hooded eye may never see
The Star above the Manger!
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JOSEPH WILLIAM HOLDEN
The Author. — Joseph William Holden, the son of Gover-
nor W. W. Holden, was born in Raleigh, N. C, September
30, 1844. He attended school in Raleigh until he reached
his seventeenth year, when he enlisted in the Confederate
Army and was sent to Roanoke Island. He was taken
prisoner and remained in captivity about a year, when
he was released on parole and returned home. His father
at this time was editor of the Raleigh Standard, and
Joseph became his associate.
After his father was elected Governor, and after his
father's impeachment, the son moved West and became
reporter on the Leavenworth (Kansas) Times. After
several months in the West he returned to Raleigh where
he died soon afterward. He was twice member of the
• General Assembly and once Speaker of the House. He
was at one time Mayor of Raleigh.
His fame rests on his poems, and especially his "Hat-*
teras," which has been copied widely. Other poems of
merit written by him are "Love's Melancholy," "Hymn,"
and "A Home Above."
HATTERAS
Note. — The wind king of the north challenges the torrid
god at Hatteras. Here is the meeting place of the cold winds
of the North and the warm winds of the South. Ten vessels
stood idly by when the contest began, which was fearful and
typical of the severe storms on the coast. Nine of the vessels
were sunk in this "Golgotha of the Sea" where vessels have
been wrecked since Sir Walter Raleigh's time, and where "scat-
tered bones have lain and bleached for ages."
The Wind King from the North came down,
Nor stopped by river, mount or town,
But like a boisterous god at play,
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JOSEPH WILLIAM HOLDEN 83
Resistless bounded on his way.
He shook the lake and tore the wood,
And flapped his wings in merry mood,
Nor furled them till he spied afar
The white caps' flash on Hatteras bar,*
Where fierce Atlantic landward bowls
'er treacherous sands and hidden shoals.
He paused, then wreathed his horn of cloud
And blew defiance, long and loud ;
' Come up ! Come up ! thou torrid god,
That rul'st the Southern sea, —
Ho ! lightning-eyed and thunder-shod,
Come wrestle here with me!
As tossest thou the tangled cane
111 hurl thee o'er the boiling main!"
The angry heavens hung dark and still
Like Arctic night on Hecla's Hill; t
The mermaids sporting on the waves,
Affrighted, fled to coral caves ;
The billow checked its curling crest,
And, trembling, sank to sudden rest;
All ocean stilled its heaving breast,
Reflected darkness, weird and dread,
An inky plain the waters spread —
Amid the elemental lull,
When nature died and death lay dull,
As though itself were sleeping there —
Becalmed upon that dismal flood
Ten fated vessels idly stood,
And not a timber creaked !
* Cape Hatteras, on the coast of North Carolina, is the most
dangerous Cape on the Atlantic Coast on account of the sand-
bars that jut far out into the sea.
t Mount Hecla is a volcano in Iceland.
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84 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Dim silence held each hollow hull,
Save when some sailor in that night,
Oppressed with darkness and despair,
Some seaman, groping for the light,
Rose up and shrieked.
They cried like children, lost and lorn :
"Oh, Lord,, deliver while you may!
Sweet Jesus, drive this gloom away !
Forever fled, oh, lovely day !
I would that I were never born! ,,
For stoutest souls were terror-thrilled,
And warmest hearts with horror chilled.
' ' Come up ! Come up ! thou torrid god,
Thou lightning-eyed and thunder-shod,
Come wrestle here with me!"
'Twas heard and answered: "Lo, I come
From azure Caribee X
To drive thee cowering to thy home
And melt its walls of frozen foam !"
From every isle and mountain dell,
From plains of pathless chapparel,
From tidebuilt bars, where sea birds dwell
He drew his lurid legions forth —
And sprang to meet the white-plumed North
Can mortal tongue in song convey
The fury of that fearful fray?
How ships were splintered at a blow —
Sails shivered into sheets of snow —
And seaman hurled to death below !
Two gods commingling, bolt and blast.
The huge waves on each other cast,
And bellowed o 'er the raging waste ;
Then sped, like harnessed steeds afar,
Amid the midnight din of war !
t Caribee, a sea southeast of the Gulf of Mexico.
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JOSEPH WILLIAM HOLDEN 85
False Hatteras ! when the cyclone came
Your waves leapt up with hoarse acclaim
And ran and wrecked yon argosy!
Fore'er nine sank ! That lone bulk stands
Embedded in thy yellow sands —
An hundred hearts in death then stilled,
And yet its ribs, with corpses filled,
Are now caressed by thee !
Smile on, smile on, thou watery hell,
And toss those skulls upon thy shore ;
The sailor's widow knows thee well;
His children beg from door to door
And shiver while they strive to tell
How thou hast robbed the wretched poor !
Yon lipless skull shall speak for me,
This is Golgotha of the Sea !
And its keen hunger is the same
In winter's frost or summer's flame!
When life was young, adventure sweet,
I came with Walter Raleigh's fleet,
But here my scattered bones have lain
And bleached for ages by the main !
Though lonely once, strange folks have come,
Till peopled is my barren home,
Enough are here. Oh, heed the cry,
Ye white-winged strangers sailing by!
The bark that lingers on this wave,
Will find its smiling but a grave !
Then, tardy, mariner, turn and flee,
A myriad wrecks are on the lea!
With swelling sail and sloping mast,
Accept kind Heaven's propitious blast!
Oh, ship, sail on! Oh, ship, sail fast,
Till thou, Golgotha's quick-sands past,
Hath gained the open sea at last.
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EMMA A. LEHMAN
The Author. — Emma A. Lehman is a native of Salem,
N. C, and a member of the Moravian Church. She was
educated at Salem Female Academy, and in 1864 she en-
tered the Academy as a teacher. Nearly a half century of
continuous service as teacher in that famous institution is
a fine testimonial of her worth. Since 1878, however, she
has had charge of the senior class and has filled the Chair
of English in the college. She is a real nature-lover, and
her interest even in "the meanest flower that blows' ' led
her to discover a new plant which was named by the State
Botanist of New York "Monotropsis Lehmani." She has
written a great deal. In 1889 she spent the summer in
Europe, and later published a sketch of her travels. She
has written poems for various publications. In 1904 the
Grafton Press published a small volume for her called
"Poems." The selections given below are taken from it.
QUEEN FLORA'S OPENING DAY
Where were the flowers the long winter through?
. What were they doing while the year was new?
They were busily working, embroidering their robes,
Coloring each leaf-bud and folding it close.
The Hepatica labored a long, long time
To perfect its tints for the genial sunshine;
It planned, and trimmed, and cheerily wrought
Its delicate leaves in the springtime sought.
The Blood-root gathered its juices so red,
And stored them up, while apparently dead.
The Violet shyly and modestly sat,
Blending the shades for its new spring hat.
Its perfumes were stored in numberless cells,
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EMMA A. LEHMAN 87
Ready to spread o 'er its blossoming bells.
It chose its own corner in which to bide
When spring winds should summon to every hillside
The Butterfly courier was preening his wing
To herald the approach of the Fairy Queen.
He practiced a tune caught from Oberon's lute,
And gave its first notes while the fields still were mute ;
Queen Flora was dozing and dreaming all day,
Her work being done by each busy fay.
Her servants were waiting to marshal her clan,
Whenever her signal was heard in the glen.
Ten thousand buds were waiting to dress
The trees in their springtime loveliness;
The bees sent out in the early dawn
To know the date of the opening morn ;
The Prime Minister consulted the Sun
To know if the work of the flowers was done —
To ask if old Boreas had gone to his lair,
To see if Jack Frost still lurked in the air.
When all was ready the signal was given
To every spring flower found under Heaven.
They sprang to their places in happiest mood,
And in perfected beauty all waiting they stood.
The South Wind swung his baton around,
And all joined the chorus above the ground.
The summer flowers still waited below,
Eager to hear their summons to go.
The Orchestra of Nature burst forth into play
Its anthem of welcome to April and May.
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88 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
THE SNOW
Silently, patiently, steadily down,
Covering the roofs of the gray old town —
Down from the leaden, exhaustless sky,
Feathery, filmy, the soft flakes fly,
Clothing with ermine each unsightly stone,
While the wind dies out in a sobbing moan.
Vistas and arches of marble abound,
Cherubs and statues seem hovering around,
Bushes are bordered inch-deep with pearl,
While faster and faster the soft flakes whirl.
The brown old earth lies quiet and still
While bridal robes deck each far-off hill.
The virgin snow! how pure it lies,
Icy and chaste, as it fell from the skies !
No earth-born stain disfigures the sight,
Emblem of purity — stainless as light,
Wrapping the earth in its mantle deep,
Whence the gentle snowdrops will coyly creep.
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MARIE BATTERHAM UNDESAY
The Author — Marie Batterham Lindesay, second daugh-
ter of William Batterham, was born in Walsoken, Norfolk,
England. The Batterham family emigrated to North Caro-
lina in 1881. Soon after coming to this State the subject
of this sketch married in Asheville, which has been her
home for many years. She is now sojourning in Chatta-
nooga, Term. She has published one volume of poems,
and is now preparing to publish a second volume.
SONG
By the placid Swanannoa
Lived the red man years gone by,
Pished and hunted, smoked and slumbered,
Sheltered by the mountains high.
In his wigwam, by the streamlet,
Dwelt his squaw of dusky face,
Reared his young ones, lithe and active,
For the field and for the chase.
Little reck'd he of the rumors
Of another day to be,
Of a strange and wondrous pale-face
Coming o'er the mighty sea.
Fished and hunted, smoked and slumbered,
While the river murmured on,
Careless as its peaceful waters,
Till his fleeting day was gone.
By the placid Swanannoa
Lives another race to-day:
Red man, wigwam, squaw, and papoose
Into silence passed away.
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90 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
PEACE
Sound it out o'er many waters,
Voice it o'er the land to-day
To old Eden's sons and daughters
Wheresoe'er they dwell or stray;
Paint it on a banner golden,
Fling it wide to every breeze,
Tell it to the cities olden,
Tropic isles and frozen seas.
Blazon it with trumpet voices
Where they build the men-o'-war,
Where brisk industry rejoices,
Ever planning on before;
Where the mighty armies drilling
With the sabre, gun, and drum —
All a nation's ardor filling —
That the Day of Peace must come.
Keenest swords to plowshares beaten,
And to pruning hooks their spears,
Where the waving acres sweeten,
And the vine in plenty bears.
Youth no more to train for battles,
Men no more to fight and die,
Where the cannon's thunder rattles
And the bullet's "ping" is nigh.
Sown the earth with tumults deadly,
Strewn the air with groans and cries,
While grim Passion's cruel medley
Darkens horror to the skies —
Sweeping to us grand and stately,
Nears a day we all may see,
When we shall, rejoicing greatly,
From the lust of war be free.
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MARIE BATTERHAM LINDESAY 91
JOHNNY'S STORY
"My papa is a drunkard,
My grandpa runs a bar,
My mother takes in washing —
And this is where we are :
There's just a bite to eat at home,
And mostly it's a crust.
I wish we had a turkey-spread, —
I'd eat until I bust.
"The children never can be clothed,
For mother's at the tub —
And from sun-up until sun-down
It's wash and rinse and rub:
It's Johnny here, and Johnny there,
And hurry, buy some soap,
And tend the baby, big and small,
Or else an end of rope !
"The money filters slowly by,
And mother's wore and ill;
I wonder why — for once up-town
I peeped in grandpa's till;
'Twas running full of money,
Quarters, dollars, dimes.
I wish I was a man — I'd let
The women vote — sometimes!"
WHAT IS WORTH WHILE?
As we lose the fever and folly
That men have miscalled youth,
There is nothing that counts but goodness,
And nothing worth telling but truth.
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SAMUEL HABLEY LYLE, JR.
The Author. — Samuel Harley Lyle, Jr., was born in
Franklin, Macon County, North Carolina, May 14, 1889.
He was educated at Franklin High School and the Univer-
sity of North Carolina, graduating from the latter institu-
tion in the class of 1908. The following year he became
editor of the Franklin Press and manager of the Franklin
Press Publishing Company. He has published three vol-
umes of poetry, " Leaves of Life," "Ways of Men," and
"By-Ways." His poems have appeared in The North
Carolina Review, Watson's Jeffersonian, The Atlanta Jour-
nal, and The Charlotte Observer.
MORN AND EVE
Rippling streams and song of birds,
And crimson with the gray;
The morn bursts bright in the dawn's first light —
Little girl, good-day!
Evening calm and low of kine,
And the flash of a swallow's flight;
Whispering breeze in the twilight trees —
Little girl, good-night!
A SONG OF AUTUMN.
let us away to the hills to-day,
Just you and me, my dear;
Away from the life of worldly strife,
For Autumn again is here.
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»' JdUEL HARLEY LYLE, JR. 93
^ i in the air, and sunlight fair
' alls over the brooding hills;
P jie lure of the wild holds me, Earth's child,
In a grasp that quickens and thrills.
O let us away to the hills to-day,
Just you and me, my dear, —
Sunlight and love, trees whispering above, —
The Autumn again is here!
THE SONG OP THE BUCCANEER
Come fare ye forth, my jolly lads,
Come fare ye forth with me ;
We're off for the land of the Southern sun,
And the blue of the Southern sea.
The blue of the Southern sea, my lads,
And the glint of Spanish gold, —
Throw full the sail to the Southward breeze,
As did Hawkins and Drake of old.
As did Hawkins and Drake of old, my lads,
With whom we swept the Main;
For though Drake is gone and Hawkins dead,
We'll down the Spaniard again.
Well down the Spaniard again, my lads,
And well waste his stolen lands;
For English brawn and English hearts
Ne'er lost at Spanish hands.
So hoist ye all the sail, my lads,
Put out the ship to sea;
We're off again for the Spanish Main,
And the spoil of victory!
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94 NORTH CAROLINA POEiWr
WHERE FAIRIES PLAY \
\
When sunset shadows fall across v.
\in
The glade, and bees are homeward bound,
And all the forest rings aloud
V
With evening 's symphony of sound ; Y*
When birds are singing good-night songs,
And swallows come on circling wing,
And from the marsh the frogs' deep lays
In hoarse and rumbling cadence ring, —
Tis then I lie beneath the trees,
Where golden moonbeams glint and glance ;
And from the forest glides a troupe
Of fairies in a mystic dance.
In maddest riot of reckless glee
They whirl and trip about the vale ;
And some are dandies in fine silks,
And some are knights in tested mail.
And little lady-fairies, too,
Are there, pretty beyond impeach ;
And they can coquet with a fan,
Or blush before a whispered speech.
Each little lady has her knight,
Each knight his winsome fairy lass;
Their voices rise in gayest mirth,
Tripping about the warm, sweet grass.
All night beneath the brooding moon
The fairies play, and pleasure rings,
Till at the dawn they slip away,
And leave the world to baser things.
\
\
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SAMUEL HARLEY LYLB, JR. 95
A SONG OP THE ROAD
A lashing fringe of dripping hedge
Along the wet roadway,
The night shuts in with thunder's din,
And lightnings flame and play.
A wanderer over the world am I,
With never a tie to bind;
I sing a song as I swing along,
Nor care for storm or wind.
Oh, what avails the wild wind's roar,
Or lightning's flash and flare?
Somewhere, I know, a light burns low,
And a woman is waiting there.
Somewhere beyond the Hills of Doubt,
In the Valley "Where Dreams Come True,
Flowers are bright as the starlit night,
And skies are clear and blue.
The Past is dead in the dust of things,
The Present an empty cry ;
We may weep to-night, but the morrow's light
Will bring a cloudless sky.
Beyond the hills a light burns low,
And a woman is waiting there ;
A laugh for the rain, the stress and the pain,
The morrow, I know, dawns fair !
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96 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
LIFE'S VICTORS
For these, the world-applauded ones, the few
Who dream, and, waiting, realize the dream
In full fruition, finding all things true
In life; the seekers of the rainbow gleam,
"Whose feet have trod the smooth and rose-strewn way
That lies through lands of joy, and leads along
The fields that bloom with everlasting May, —
For these, Life's favored ones, I have no song.
Tis those who strive, and find the striving gall,
Replete with failure all the toiling years,
Yet face the blows and smile, knowing the fall,
And have no part with cravens or with tears ;
The victors they of Life, counting the cost,
Who fight, unbeaten still, when all is lost.
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JOHN CHARLES McNEILL
The Author. — John Charles McNeill was born in Scot-
land County, North Carolina, July 26, 1874. Spring Hill,
the name of the community in which he was born and
reared, is in the heart of the original Scotch settlement
of North Carolina. McNeill's grandfathers emigrated
from Argyleshire, Scotland, about the beginning of the
nineteenth century. John Charles was educated at "Wake
Forest, graduating at the head of his class. He remained
one year after graduating and received the degree of
Master of Arts. In 1900 he was elected Assistant Profes-
sor of English in Mercer University, Georgia, but after a
year he returned to North Carolina to practice law, hav-
ing received his license in 1897. He opened his office in
Laurinburg, but the legal profession had no charms for
him. The Century Magazine was already publishing his
verses, and the inclination was to follow his pen. After
the death of Erwin Avery, John Charles was called to the
Charlotte Observer. His verses promptly commanded
the praise of readers throughout the State, and he was
unanimously awarded the Patterson Cup for the best lit-
erary production of the year. Soon he published his
first volume entitled, " Songs Merry and Sad," from which
these selections are taken by permission of the publishers,
the Stone & Barringer Company, of Charlotte. The bright,
youthful spirit, however, was soon brought to an earthly
end. He suffered for months with an incurable malady,
dying October 17, 1907, in his thrity-third year, at the
old home in Scotland County. After his death a second
volume was published under the title of "Lyrics Prom
Cotton Land," containing many poems in negro dialect.
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98 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
AWAY DOWN HOME
T will not be long before they hear
The bull-bat on the hill,
And in the valley through the dusk
The pastoral whippoorwill.
A few more friendly suns will call
The bluets through the loam
And star the lanes with buttercups
Away down home.
" Knee-deep !" from reedy places
Will sing the river frogs.
The terrapins will sun themselves
On all the jutting logs.
The angler's cautious oar will leave
A trail of drifting foam
Along the shady currents
Away down home.
The mocking-bird will feel again
The glory of his wings,
And wanton through the balmy air
And sunshine while he sings.
With a new cadence in his call,
The glint-wing 'd crow will roam
Prom field to newly-furrowed field
Away down home.
When dogwood blossoms mingle
With the maple's modest red,
And sweet arbutus wakes at last
From out her winter's bed,
'Twould not seem strange at all to meet
A dryad or a gnome,
Or Pan or Psyche in the woods
Away down home.
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JOHN CHARLES McNEILL 99
Then come with me, thou weary heart !
Forget thy brooding ills,
Since God has come to walk among
His valleys and His hills !
The mart will never miss thee,
Nor the scholar's dusty tome
And the Mother waits to bless thee
Away down home.
M. W. RANSOM
(Died October 8, 1904)
For him, who in a hundred battles stood
Scorning the cannon's mouth,
Grimy with flame and red with foeman's blood,
For thy sweet sake, South :
Who, wise as brave, yielded his conquered sword
At a vain war's surcease,
And spoke, thy champion still, the statesman's word
In the calm halls of peace ;
Who pressed the ruddy wine to thy faint lips,
Where thy torn body lay,
And saw afar time's white insailing ships
Bringing a happier day:
Oh, mourn for him, dear land that gave him birth !
Bow low thy sorrowing head!
Let thy seared leaves fall silent on the earth
Whereunder he lies dead !
In field and halls, in valor and in grace,
In wisdom's livery,
Gentle and brave, he moved with knightly pace,
A worthy son of thee !
4 \i*5iJ\J\9
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100 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
OCTOBER
The thought of old, dear things is in thine eyes,
O, month of memories !
Musing on days thine heart hath sorrow of,
Old joy, dead hope, dear love,
I see thee stand where all thy sisters meet
To cast down at thy feet
The garnered largess of the fruitful year,
And on thy cheek a tear.
Thy glory flames in every blade and leaf
To blind the eyes of grief;
Thy vineyards and thine orchards bend with fruit
That sorrow may be mute;
A hectic splendor lights thy days to sleep,
Ere the gray dusk may creep
Sober and sad along thy dusty ways,
Like a lone nun, who prays;
High and faint-heard thy passing migrant calls;
Thy lazy lizard sprawls
On his gray stone, and many slow winds creep
About thy hedge, asleep ;
The sun swings farther toward his love, the south,
To kiss her glowing mouth;
And Death, who steals among thy purpling bowers,
Is deeply hid in flowers.
"Would that thy streams were Lethe, and might flow
Where lotus blossoms blow,
And all the sweets wherewith thy riches bless
Might hold no bitterness !
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JOHN CHARLES McNBILL 101
Would, in thy beauty, we might all forget
Dead days and old regret,
And through thy realm might fare us forth to roam,
Having no thought for home !
And yet I feel, beneath thy queen's attire,
Woven of blood and fire,
Beneath the golden glory of thy charm
Thy mother heart beats warm,
And if, mayhap, a wandering child of thee,
Weary of land and sea,
Should turn him homeward from his dreamer's quest
To sob upon thy breast,
Thine arm would fold him tenderly, to prove
How thine eyes brimmed with love,
And thy dear hand, with all a mother's care,
Would rest upon his hair.
SUNBURNT BOYS
Note. — The present prosy name of Lumber River was con-
sidered by the poet as a corruption of the appropriate Indian
name, "Lumbee," meaning "crooked."
Down on the Lumbee River
Where the eddies ripple cool
Your boat, I know, glides stealthily
About some shady pool.
The summer's heats have lulled asleep
The fish-hawk's chattering noise,
And all the swamp lies hushed about
You sunburnt boys.
You see the minnow 's waves that rock
The cradled lily leaves.
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102 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Prom a far field some farmer's song,
Singing among his sheaves,
Comes mellow to you where you sit,
Each man with boatman's poise,
There, in the shimmering water lights,
You sunburnt boys.
I know your haunts : each gnarly bole
That guards the waterside,
Each tuft of flags and rushes where
The river reptiles hide,
Each dimpling nook wherein the bass
His eager life employs
Until he dies — the captive of
You sunburnt boys.
You will not — will you? — soon forget
When I was one of you,
Nor love me less that time has borne
My craft to currents new;
Nor shall I ever cease to share
Your hardships and your joys,
Robust, rough-spoken, gentle-hearted
Sunburnt boys.
THE OPEN FIRE
'Tis the crumple of footfalls soft in the snow,
The crunch, crunch, crunch, where the embers glow.
Tis the flutter of snow winds, stirring the trees;
The murmur of distant, beckoning seas.
Whatever the heart of a man may desire,
He sees or he hears in the winter night's fire.
Alas, for the flickering dreams that flare
One moment, and pass to the upper air!
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JOHN CHARLES McNEILL 103
But the darker the night the brighter the gleam,
And the sadder the heart the gladder the dream.
The lonelier he who may muse at the fire,
The sweeter his vision of all his desire.
Alas, for gray ashes and smoke that is fled,
As soul flees from body when dreams all are dead!
But between the wing'd smoke and the bed of gray
ashes,
Life mounting on death, the eager flame flashes.
And upward untiring doth climb and aspire —
Man's emblem and nature's — the winter night's fire.
AT SEA
When the dim, tall sails of the ships were in motion,
Ghostly, and slow, and silent-shod,
We gazed where the dusk fled over the ocean,
A great gray hush, like the shadow of God.
The sky dome cut with its compass in sunder
A circle of sea from the darkened land, —
A circle of tremulous waste and wonder,
O'er which one groped with a childish hand.
The true stars came to their stations in heaven,
The false stars shivered deep down in the sea,
And the white crests went like monsters, driven
By winds that never would let them be,
And there, where the elements mingled and muttered,
We stood, each man with a lone dumb heart,
Full of the vastness that never was uttered
By symbol of words or by echo of art.
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ABRAHAM FOREST MOREHEAD
The Author. — Abraham Forest Morehead was the
youngest son of John Morehead, of Rockingham County,
a Revolutionary soldier. He was born on the 28th of
November, 1814, and graduated at the University of North
Carolina as the valedictorian of his class. He obtained his
license to practice law and located in Greensboro, but a
few months afterward he died in the twenty-second year
of his age. Of course his short career furnishes very little
for the historian other than his poems. But his ancestors
on his paternal and maternal sides are prominent in the
history of the State and the Nation. Other poems that he
published are, "The Mississippi/ ' "The Genius of Dan,"
"Mountain Eclogue,' ' "Lines Pound on His Table," and
"Conscience, Reflection, and Repentance."
THE HILLS OP DAN
Note. — The Dan River flows through Rockingham County,
and the hills gradually rise above the river until the Blue Ridge
Mountains are reached. No section of North Carolina below
the mountains is more picturesque than the hills of Dan in
Rockingham County. It was this landscape that inspired the
author.
The world is not one garden spot,
One pleasure ground for man;
Pew are the spots that intervene
Such as the Hills of Dan !
Though fairer prospects greet mine eyes
In nature's partial plan,
Yet I am bound by stronger ties
To love the Hills of Dan.
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ABRAHAM FOREST MOREHEAD 105
The breezes that around them play,
And the bright streams they fan,
Are loved as scenes of childhood's day,
Amid the Hills of Dan.
Here, too, the friends of early days,
Their fated courses ran;
And now they find a resting place
Amid the Hills of Dan.
Ye saw the twilight of my dawn,
When first my life began;
And ye shall see that light withdrawn,
My native Hills of Dan.
Whatever fortune may ensue,
In life 's short, changeful span,
Oft mem'ry shall turn back to view
My native Hills of Dan.
The love that warms this youthful breast
Shall glow within the man ;
And when I slumber, may I rest
Amid the Hills of Dan.
THE GENIUS OP DAN
The famous old Bards of antiquity say
Each object terrene has a quick 'ning fay,
Like the soul which animates man ;
They teach there are spirits in oceans and seas,
In mountains and rivers, in forests and trees,
And why may not I, with such warrants as these,
Attribute a Genius to Dan?
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106 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS '
Oh, yes, there are spirits wherever the mind
Amid the wide compass of Nature can find
Aught that gives pleasure to scan, —
It shows its own soul with the charm it enjoys,
And when it holds converse, tho' wanting a voice,
The language of feeling is all it employs ;
And such is my Genius of Dan.
Oh lovely creation! tho* fancied thou art,
Yet few real friends are so dear to my heart,
Since our acquaintance began;
For truly I deem thee as wholly mine own —
A part of myself, coming from me alone,
Who gave thee a being, and gave thee a throne,
Aid called thee the Genius of Dan.
Yes, well can I mind when concealed on the banks
I drew to my ambush the bright finny ranks,
Then homeward exulting ran;
And while my acknowledgments justly knew,
For this my good fortune to some one were due,
Some secret interpreter held to my view
Bright imaged, — the Genius of Dan.
I stood on the hills and surveyed from my height
All the beauties that Summer displayed to my sight,-
The bright flowing stream as it ran, —
The wide-spreading wood and the corn-laden field,
The peace and contentment that Plenty revealed,
And who by some spirit these blessings could yield 1
I thought 'twas the Genius of Dan.
There rose in the midst of that beautiful scene
A village whose aspect was dreary I ween
When first its existence began;
But now all that lonely appearance has fled,
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ABRAHAM FOREST MOREHEAD 107
And beauty, and Talents, and Riches instead,
Awoke by the Genius of Dan.
Accept, lovely Spirit, this tribute of lays,
This first feeble effort — a hymn in thy praise,
From a son of thy mountain clan, —
And believe me, I love thee, whatever thou art;
From mem'ry thine image shall never depart,
Till some of thy daughters steal off my heart,
And rob thee — bright Genius of Dan.
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JAMES CHESTER ROCKWELL
The Author. — James Chester Rockwell was born near
Whiteville, in Columbus County, N. C, in 1868, the son of
Capt. Henry C. Rockwell and Sarah Powell Rockwell. His
early education was received in the local schools and un-
der the late Professor W. G. Quackenbush, of Laurinburg.
Among the poets embraced in his reading were Burns,
Poe, Ryan, Hayne, Hill, and Boner, upon all of whom
there are extant poems or essays among Mr. Rockwell's
writings. Against odds that would have discouraged a
less brilliant student, he acquired also a splendid knowl-
edge of Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and German. He wrote
verses from his early youth, and most of his poems
were written before he was nineteen years of age. At
twenty he was a theological student in Louisville, Ky.
Here his health first failed, and later in his pastorate at
Morristown, Tenn., there was no hopeful improvement.
He died in his twenty-sixth year, leaving a widow (who
was Miss Loula Ayres, of Marion Co., S. C.,) two sons, and
a daughter, who now reside in Asheville, N. C. The selec-
tions here given indicate in some degree the young poet's
power of expression and the range of his gifts. " Night,' '
an exquisite word-picture, and "She Is My Queen," a
pleasing bit of playfulness, were written at the age of sev-
enteen, the other selections at the age of eighteen years.
NIGHT
The twilight puts her soft gray hand
Upon the pulse of day;
A silence falls o'er all the land,
The daylight dies away.
Drawn by the breeze of eventide,
Upon her phantom car,
She climbs the darksome mountain side,
And lights the signal star.
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JAMES CHESTER ROCKWELL 109
Then gleams afar another light —
A glowing flame the skies;
Across the silver sea the Night
On dusky pinion flies.
The daylight and the eventide
Like fleeting dreams have flown;
With sceptre swaying far and wide,
The Night sits on the throne.
HE CAME AND WENT ^
He came and went. Why question further,
If he performed his mission well?
For he who judgeth all things rightly,
Alone can tell.
This much we know : that he was faithful
And e 'er on duty was intent.
Ask me no more. This is his story :
He came and went.
THE POET'S STORY
The sweetest songs are those that spring
Prom hearts that bleed, and, bleeding, sing ;
Through songs like these doth ever roll
The mystic music of the soul.
II.
If we have weal, if we have woe,
If we have rights, if we have wrongs,
The world must all our feelings know —
We tell our stories in our songs.
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110 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
SHE IS MY QUEEN
Her sweet blue eyes — I see them still —
They haunt me through the distance?
Strive to forget them, if I will,
They conquer all resistance.
Her dainty form — a dream of grace-
Flits past me in my dreaming;
I see a smile upon her face —
Her blue eyes brightly beaming.
And 0, I love, — no tongue can tell
The power of my passion;
I can but love her, for — ah, well,
To love her is the fashion.
And I — ah, me, I am at best
A lover 'mid a dozen;
And I but worship with the rest —
She is my baby cousin.
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JAMES BIDDLE SHEPABD
The Author. — James Biddle Shepard was born on No-
vember 14, 1815, in New Bern, N. C. He was a son of
William Biddle Shepard of that place, and wife, Mary
Blount, of "Elmwood," Pasquotank County. He was
educated at the University of North Carolina, and grad-
uated with the first honors of his class in 1834. Later he
studied law and was admitted to the bar. He was State
Senator from Wake County in 1842, and a Eepresentative
in 1844. At one time he was United States District At-
torney for North Carolina, but was "too wealthy to un-
dergo the drudgery of the bar." He was a Democrat in
politics, and his party nominated him for Governor in
1846, but the Whig nominee, William A. Graham, defeated
him in the election which followed. Mr. Shepard married
Frances Donnell, of New Bern, and left an only son, John
Eobert Donnell Shepard, who has resided in Paris, France,
for some years past. James B. Shepard died in Ealeigh
on the 17th of June, 1871, and is buried in the eastern end
of the old City Cemetery, along with numerous members
of his family, the remains of several of whom he had
caused to be brought from the eastern part of the State,
for reinterment at Raleigh, several months before his
death.
THE PILOT
Note.— Pilot Mountain, one of nature's wonders, is located in
the eastern part of Surry County, North Carolina. It rises, an
isolated pile in the midst of a plain, to an elevation of over
1,500 feet. The pinnacle, which is over 200 feet high, is an
almost perpendicular rock wall with an area on the summit of
about two acres. This mountain can be seen for sixty or sev-
enty miles, and was called Pilot by the Indians because it
served as a guide in their hunting and war routes.
Ill
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112 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
All-shadowing Pilot ! high, and lone, and cold,
Thou rear'st thy form in grandeur, and the light
Which gilds thy brow at sunset, as of old,
Shall be to thee a diadem all bright,
Amid the ages distant and untold,
To guide the pilgrim's dim and failing sight
Along thy battlements. And now the sun
Goes down behind the mountains — day is gone.
'Tis night upon the Pilot ! come and see
The startling of the mighty pile ;
Look how the lightnings glance — and now the free
Wild winds are rushing o 'er this earth-born isle,
Thrown up amid the wide and desert sea
The clouds are gathering, and no lovely smile
Of the bright stars is ours. Hark ! the tone
Of the loud thunder from its flashing throne !
Night on the Pilot ! Prom the stormy west
The clouds are mustering, and their banners gleam
In shadowy glory, and their folds are dress 'd
In the mild livery of Orion's beam.
And now each glen and lofty mountain's crest
Grow bright beneath the moon's resplendent stream
Of living radiance. Now the light is gone,
And darkness girds us with her rayless zone.
The morn is up — the bright and dewy morn —
And the darkness rolls from off the lofty pile,
And voices, deep and wild, and mountain born,
Go up in thankfulness ; for now the smile
Of day is on us; now the huntsman's horn
Winds its rich numbers through each deep defile,
Startling the eagle from his high abide
Mid the rough crags where mortal foot ne 'er trod.
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JAMES BIDDLE SHEPARD 113
EOANOKB
Note. — The Roanoke River rises in Virginia and enters
North Carolina near the foot of the Blue Ridge, where it is
known as the Dan. Later, it flows back into Virginia and
returns to North Carolina as the Roanoke. Two famous states-
men lived near this river, John Randolph, of Virginia, and
Nathaniel Macon, of North Carolina, who were life-long friends.
I stand upon the banks of the proud Roanoke.
Father of waters ! thou dost roll along
With a glad music ; and the lightning stroke
Of time is on thee, yet the splendid throng
Of thy far-sweping waves is all unbroke,
Save when the boatman, with his mellow songs,
Speeds o'er their bosom, laden with a store
Of wealth, late gathered from thy fertile shore.
And who tacked thy name,t old glorious stream,
Unto his own, tho' sometimes strange and wild,
In his mad moments when he spoke by steam,
Playing the statesman now, and now the child,
Was yet like thee (when Reason's steady beam
Shone full upon him), deep, and strong, and clear,
What shield could parry his avenging spear?
The meteor of a season. We did gaze
Upon the splendors of his fiery way,
As through stars, undazzled by their blaze,
He sought the pristine fount of perfect day.
The day of Truth. And still the unclouded ray
Of Fame's high sun upon his actions play,
Gilding his name and garnishing his tomb,
Where fadeless myrtle and bright laurel bloom.
t John Randolph of Roanoke.
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114
NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
And there was one } whose light was fixed and clear,
Whose deeds were seen by all men, and whose fame
Is all-enduring. Bow we lowly here,
For 'tis the spot where honest Macon came,
Like a ripe sheaf, unto his honored bier!
Who ever went down with a brighter name
To death's long slumbers? Hallowed be the rest
Of him who sleeps below, by millions blest !
Like the mild star of evening, he arose
On the horizon of his country, when
Her soil was trampled by beleaguering foes,
And the dread war sounds filled each hill and glen ;
And like the star which sets at evening's close,
Was his declension. Streams of fadeless light
Still gild the heavens which hide him now from
sight.
t Nathaniel Macon of North Carolina.
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BENJAMIN SLEDD
The Author. — Benjamin Sledd was born in Bedford,
County, Virginia, August 27, 1864. He graduated at
Washington and Lee University in 1886. After leaving
this institution he spent one year at Johns Hopkins Uni-
versity, and in 1888 became Professor of English in Wake
Forest College, North Carolina, which position he still
holds. Professor Sledd is a real teacher, and for nearly a
quarter of a century has been instructing the young men
of Wake Forest College and aiding them to interpret the
best in English literature. John Charles McNeill was his
pupil, and the pupil receiving encouragement and direc-
tion from the teacher-poet lived only long enough to see
his own verse appreciated and that of his teacher honored.
Professor Sledd has edited text-books and contributed
much to the literature of the South. Two volumes of
poems have been published — "From Cliff and Scaur* ' in
1897, and "The Watchers of the Hearth" in 1901. Now
in the hands of his publishers, to appear next year, are
two other volumes: "Old South Idylls" and "Margaret
and Miriam: a Book of Verse for All Who Love Little
Children." The following poem is taken from "The
Watchers of the Hearth":
THE CHILDREN
No more of work ! Yet ere I seek my bed,
Noiseless into the children's room I go,
With its four little couches all a-row,
And bend a moment over each dear head.
Those soft, round arms on the pillow spread,
Those dreaming lips babbling more than we know,
One tearful, smothered sigh of baby woe —
Fond words of chiding, would they were unsaid!
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116 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
And while on each moist brow a kiss I lay,
With tremulous rapture grown almost to pain,
Close at my side I hear a whispered name : —
Our long-lost babe, who with the dawning came,
And in the midnight went from us again.
And with bowed head one good-night more I said.
THE MYSTERY OP THE WOODS
Vaguer it seems than a vision
Dreamed in an hour unknown, —
A grave with pines overshadowed,
And strange wild life overgrown.
The first of earth's dark secrets
By curious childhood found,
Much did I wonder what meaning
Lay hid in that little mound.
And once — still must I remember
The dreary autumn day —
All trembling with nameless terror,
I ceased from childish play,
Saying, "Death — what is it, mother V 9
Sadly she made reply,
Clasping her arms about me:
"Thou at find out by and by."
But life's first perfect gladness,
I never felt it more,
Nor ever again was the sunshine
So sweet as it was before.
For long, long years I waited,
The answer still I wait,
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BENJAMIN SLEDD 117
And hear but darkly murmur
The riddling lips of fate.
When I joy in the strength of morning,
And feel that life is good —
Lo, right athwart my pathway
That fateful mound in the wood.
And when I sadly question
What way beyond may lie,
A silent voice makes answer,
' 'Thou 'It know all by and by."
UNITED.
All day it shook the land — grim battle's thunder tread;
And fields at morning green, at eve are trampled red.
But now, on the stricken scene, twilight and quiet fall;
Only, from hill to hill, night's tremulous voices call;
And comes from far along, where campfires warning burn,
The dread, hushed sound which tells of morning's sad re-
turn.
Timidly nature awakens; the stars come out overhead,
And a flood of moonlight breaks like a voiceless prayer for
the dead.
And steals the blessed wind, like Odin's fairest daughter,
In viewless ministry, over the fields of slaughter;
Soothing the smitten life, easing the pang of death,
And bearing away on high the passing warrior's breath.
Two youthful forms are lying apart from the thickest fray,
The one in Northern blue, the other in Southern gray.
Around his lifeless foeman the arms of each are pressed,
And the head of one is pillowed upon the other's breast.
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118 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
As if two loving brothers, wearied with work and play,
Had fallen asleep together, at close of the summer day.
Foemen were they, and brothers? — Again the battle's din,
With its sullen, cruel answer, from far away breaks in.
THE VISION OF THE MILK-WHITE DOE
Note. — Our histories tell the story of the Lost Colony and
Virginia Dare. No one knows what became of that colony,
and the fate of the little girl born on Roanoke Island is still a
mystery. However, many legends are told concerning her,
chief of which is that of "The Milk White Doe."
The hunter by his lonely fire
Wakens in sweet, unknown desire,
To watch by the dim, delusive light
What seems a woman in raiment white,
Among the forest shadows go : —
Lingering it goes, and backward turns,
Like some sad spirit that vainly yearns
To break the bonds of its voiceless woe ;
But the light flares up from the dying brands,
And gazing out of the darkness stands
Only a milk-white doe.
A moment he marks her large dark eyes
Gazing in mournful human wise,
Then falters and sinks the faithless light.
Again the gleam as of raiment white,
The woods are stirred with a footfall slight ;
And like the dawn- wind wandering by,
The presence fades with a deep drawn sigh,
As breaks a far-heard, phantom sound
Of galloping steed and baying hound —
Then only the silence and the night.
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BENJAMIN SLEDD 119
THE WRAITH OF ROANOKE
Like a mist of the sea at morn it comes,
Gliding among the fisher-homes, —
The vision of a woman fair j
And every eve beholds her there
Above the topmost dune,
With fluttering robe and streaming hair,
Seaward gazing in dumb despair,
Like one who begs of the waves a boon.
Lone ghost of the daring few who came
And, passing, left but a tree-carved name
And the mystery of Croatan :
And out of our country's dawning years
I hear the weeping of woman's tears:
With a woman 's eyes I dimly scan,
Day after day the far blue verge,
And pray of the loud unpitying surge,
And every wind of Heaven, to urge
The sails that alone can succor her fate, —
The wigwam dark and the savage mate,
The love more cruel than crudest hate, —
Still burns on her cheek that fierce hot breath,-
And the shame too bitter to hide in death.
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HEBSET EVERETT SPENCE
The Author. — Hersey Everett Spence was born in South
Mills, Camden County, North Carolina, June 12, 1882. He
was prepared for college at South Mills High School and
entered Trinity College, Durham, N. C, in the fall of
1903, and graduated in 1907. He remained at Trinity
College one year after graduating, and in 1908 received
the degree of Master of Arts. The following year he en-
tered the ministry and served one year as pastor of Man-
gum Street Methodist Church, Durham, N. C. In 1909 he
was elected Assistant Professor of English at Trinity Col-
lege, which position he still holds. Much of his verse has
been published in the Charlotte Observer, the Raleigh
News and Observer, and in the Trinity Archive.
A CHRISTMAS PRAYER
Alone she sits,
Silent and thoughtful, by the fire's pale gleams,
While through her brain the fitful mem'ry flits
Of long-departed dreams.
The trickling tears
Plow down her furrowed face. Sad mem'ry grieves
Her lonely heart with thoughts of other years
And other Christmas eves.
Her childhood days —
She dreams of them, and of her children, too,
Once bright 'ning home-life with their winning ways ;
To-night — so far from view.
And one doth pray,
For that dear mother on this Christmas night :
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HERSEY EVERETT SPENCE 121
Keep Thou the weary feet in that strait way
That leadeth unto light.
Those withered hands,
So worn and weary with Life's tiresome task,
So faithful in fulfilling Love's commands —
Lord, give them rest, we ask.
To that dear heart,
Which ached and throbbed for me, her wayward boy,
Do Thou, Christmas Child, the lot impart
Of happiness and joy.
Around her head,
Until the weary watch of Life shall cease,
Do Thou in e'er increasing radiance shed
The holy light of peace.
BEAUTY OR POWER
O'er hill and plain the wild tornado sweeps,
Now boiling white with rage, now sable-browed ;
In lurid lines its livid lightning leaps,
In threat 'ning tones its thunder laughs aloud:
The softest sigh of summer from the hills,
That scarcely seems to move, so soft it goes,
Wafts to our ears the song of whippoorwills
And brings the smell of hyacinth and rose —
Which brings us more of God?
Far, far away in floods of ocean foam
The mighty monsters wallow in the deep,
And spouting waves from sea to sea they roam,
Or fiercely on to deadly conflict leap :
But from the depths where never breath of breeze
Disturbs its tranquil rest, a single gem
Gathers the beauty of the tropic seas
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122 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
And decks with all their wealth earth's diadem —
Which brings us more of God?
The sages talk of whither and of whence,
Of final destiny and primal cause,
They learnedly discuss God's providence,
The justice and wisdom of His laws :
A prattling baby with curls of yellow hair
Whose eyes reflect the blue of summer skies,
Shows baby trust that never knew a care
And simple confidence without disguise —
Which brings us more of God?
PAPER-FOLKS
Do you remember, sister dear, the days of long gone by,
The days of apple dumpling and huckleberry pie,
Of sugar-plums and pickles and tarts and sweetened
cream,
And biscuits full o' 'lasses that 'ud down your fingers
stream?
And have you quite forgotten how the mother, dear,
would say:
"Take your box of goodies, children, and hustle out to
play"?
How we set our little table out beneath the spreading
And in happy childish fancy played our game of " Pa-
per-folks"?
We were never rough and wicked, never liked to quar-
rel and fight,
Or, perhaps, it's just my fancy as I meditate to-night;
Man forgets his wicked deeds and brings the good alone
to mind,
That is why, I guess, the Golden Age lies in the days
behind.
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HBRSEY EVERETT SPENCE 123
B'lieve I do recall, for instance, putting sand in sugar-
pails,
And we tied some lit fire-crackers to the cats' and pup-
pies' tails;
But we never were real cruel, wicked boys could never
coax
Us to mischief, for we'd rather play with our paper-
folks.
When the summer days were over and the frost began to
fall,
And the nights grew long and chilly, sister dear, do you
recall
How the little aching fingers with their cotton-picking
sore,
Now were healed as if by magic, and upon the nursery-
floor
" Paper-folks" were played and fondled, till the mother
fondly said:
"Sleepy time for little folks," and packed us in our
trundle-bed,
There to watch the fitful firelight where the pine-knot
flames and smokes,
Still too wide-awake for sleeping, thinking of our "pa-
per-folks"?
Oh, that land of paper dollies! Land of fancy's fitful
sway!
Only place in earth or heaven where we have our wan-
ton way ;
Where the men are good and faithful and the women
never lie,
Where the children are obedient and the babies never
cry;
Where there is no doctor's "nasty stuff" to put you
'neath the sod,
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124 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
And you have your prayers all answered, since you are
your own dear god,
Where the troubles all are "make-believe" and even
quarrels are jokes,
The land of childhood's Eden, where we played at
"paper-folks."
And to-day your baby brother sits alone so far away
Dreaming of his playmate sister and his mother, now
so gray:
'Bound your feet are children playing — all save one so
young and fair
That you buried 'neath the daisies on the hill-side over
there ;
You have learned the joys and sorrows that around the
hearthstone fall,
Joys of life and home and love, and I — well, I have
missed 'em all,
As I think of you and mother and of them, there's
something chokes
And I wish I were a child again a-playing "paper-folks."
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CORNELIA PHILLIPS SPENCER
The Author. — Cornelia Phillips Spencer was born in
Harlem, N. Y., in 1825, and was only about a year old
when her father, Dr. James Phillips, moved to the Univer-
sity of North Carolina to become Professor of Mathe-
matics. In 1857 she was married to James M. Spencer,
of Alabama. Being left a widow with only one child,
a daughter, she returned to Chapel Hill and made
her home at the University, and her virile mind, fine
judgment and broad culture, made her home the chief
intellectual center of the University. Her skill as an
artist was very great and some of her sketches are rare
treasures among her friends and admirers. Her genius
as a writer wielded the greatest influence. It is probable
that no contemporary North Carolinian exercised more
influence than did Cornelia Phillips Spencer. The horrors
of reconstruction and its influence on the University gave
her a great theme, and it was a great woman that arose
to the occasion and sent a burning message to the man-
hood of the State. The University was closed and it was
her pen, more than any other's, that made a new and
greater University possible. Her "Last Ninety Days of
the War" is a vivid and strong picture of those terrible
times. She was also the author of a history of North
Carolina that was widely used in the public schools of the
State. But her greatest activity found expression in the
newspapers of the day and in personal letters. Her
daughter was married to James Lee Love, of Gastonia,
now Professor of Mathematics at Harvard. The last
several years of her life were spent at Cambridge with
her daughter. She died March 11, 1908, and her remains
were brought back to Chapel Hill and buried by the side
of her father's. The State Normal and Industrial College
honored the woman and itself when it dedicated one of
its buildings to her.
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126 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
THE UNIVERSITY'S CENTENNIAL
Note. — The University of North Carolina, one of the oldest
universities of the South, was opened to students in 1794.
This poem was written for the Centennial celebration of the
opening of this institution.
Come forth with your garlands and roses,
Entwined with the Laurel and Bay,
All that fair Carolina encloses
Be yours this festival day.
All hail! to our glorious old Mother,
Her century's crown is complete,
With loyalty due to no other,
Our homage we lay at her feet.
Tho' dimly her morning unfolded,
And tempests oft darkened her sky,
Still, to all the true hearts she has moulded,
Her colors in radiance fly;
Still she welcomes her sons to her portals,
Her cloisters re-echo their tread,
While a witnessing cloud of immortals
Drop honor and strength on her head.
All that Love and Religion have taught us,
All that Freedom and Culture bestow,
All renown that our Heroes have brought us,
To her century's vigil we owe.
Pond memory recalls her gray Teachers
Intent on their labor of love,
Her Poets, her Statesmen, her Preachers
In Temple, and Forum, and Grove.
Ye sons of fair Science still cherish
A spark from the Spirit Divine,
Ne'er a hope of our Country shall perish
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CORNELIA PHILLIPS SPENCER 127
Wherever his watch-fires shine.
For oft as a noble endeavor
Point out Where our brothers have trod,
To His altars we trace the fair river
That gladdens the city of God.
Long, long may this fountain be flowing,
Carolina be honored and blest,
The lights on this Hill-top be glowing,
While centuries pass to their rest.
Then Hail! to our glorious old Mother,
Allegiance we pledge her anew,
With homage we pay to no other,
All Hail to the White and the Blue !
INDIAN NAMES
Note. — A tribe of Cherokee Indians lives in Jackson and
Swain counties. Many of our rivers, counties and towns have
Indian names.
Ye say they all have passed away,
The race of Indian braves ;
That their light canoes have vanished
Prom off our crested waves;
That 'mid the forests where they roamed
There rings no hunter's shout;
Yet their names are on our waters :
Ye can not wash them out.
Their memory liveth on our hills,
Their baptism on our shore;
Our everlasting rivers speak
Their dialect of yore.
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128 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
'Tis heard where Swannanoa pours
Its crystal tide along;
It sounds on Nantahala's shores,
And Yadkin swells the song;
Wher'er the lordly Roanoke sweeps,
The Indian name remains;
And swift Catawba proudly keeps
The echo of its strains.
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HENBT JEBOME 8T0CKARD
The Author. — Henry Jerome Stockard, son of Mary
Johnson and James Qibbs Stockard, was born in Chatham
County, September 15, 1858. His grandfather Stockard
was a captain in the War of 1812 and his great-grand-
father was a soldier in the Revolution. His father was a
farmer and lumber dealer, who died, however, when
Henry Jerome was only twelve years of age and his edu-
cation was directed by his mother. He was educated at
Elon College and the University, receiving the degree of
Master of Arts from the former institution. After com-
pleting his college course he entered the teaching profes-
sion. He was principal of Graham Academy, County
Superintendent, Assistant Professor of English at the
University, Professor at Fredericksburg (Va.) College,
Professor of Latin at Peace Institute and until very re-
cently was President of that institution.
The genius of the poet appeared early and developed
rapidly, and for many years he has been a contributor
to the leading magazines of the country. Some of his
poems are found in Stedman's "American Anthology,' ' in
"Representative Sonnets by American Poets/ ' and in the
"Songs of the South.' ' He has published one volume of
his poems under the title "Fugitive Lines.' ' Another vol-
ume, "A Study in Southern Poetry," containing the best
selections of Southern poems edited by him, was prepared
for use as a text-book.
THE LAST CHARGE AT APPOMATTOX
Note. — Appomattox was the scene of the last battle of the
Civil War and the surrender of General Lee. General Bryan
Grimes, of North Carolina, at the command of General John
B. Gordon, of Georgia, participated in this last charge of the
Confederacy. This poem was written by request and was read
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130 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
at the unveiling of the monument erected by North Carolina
at Appomattox, April 10, 1905, in honor of her aons who made
there this last charge.
Scarred on a hundred fields before,
Naked and starved and travel-sore,
Each man a tiger, hunted,
They stood at bay as brave as Huns —
Last of the Old South 's splendid sons,
Planked by ten thousand shotted guns,
And by ten thousand fronted.
Scorched by the cannon's molten breath,
They'd climbed the trembling walls of death
And set their standards tattered: —
Had charged at the bugle's stirring blare
Through bolted gloom and godless glare
From the dead's reddened gulches, where
The searching shrapnel shattered.
They formed — that Carolina band —
With Grimes, the Spartan, in command,
And, at the word of Gordon,
Through splintered fire and stifling smoke —
They struck with lightning's scathing stroke, —
Those doomed and desperate men — and broke
Across that iron cordon.
They turned in sullen, slow retreat —
Ah ! there are laurels of defeat —
Turned, for the chief had spoken ;
With one last shot hurled back the foe,
And prayed the trump of doom to blow,
Now that the Southern stars were low
The Southern bars were broken.
Sometime the calm, impartial years
Will tell what made them dead to tears
Of loved ones left to languish ; —
What nerved them for the lonely guard,
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HENRY JEROME STOCKARD 131
• For cleaving blade and mangling shard, —
What gave them strength in tent and ward
To drain the dregs of anguish.
But the far ages will propound
What never sage hath lore to sound ; —
Why, in such fires of rancor,
The God of love should find it meet
For Him, with Grant as sledge, to beat
On Lee, the anvil, at such heat,
Our nation's great sheet-anchor.
THE EAGLE
Note. — The Eagle is symbolic of the American nation. The
first stanza tells of its beginning the second of its struggle,
and the third of the domain. From Shasta in the Rocky
Mountain he guards the Pacific slope, and from Mitchell in
the Appalachian chain he guards the Atlantic.
Brooded on the crags, his down the rocks,
He holds the skies for his domain ;
Serene, he preens where thunder shocks,
And rides the hurricane.
The scream of shells is in his shriek ;
As swords, his wings whiz down the air;
His claws, as bayonets, gride ; his beak
As shrapnel-shards, doth tear.
Where Shasta shapes its mighty cone,
Where Mitchell heaves into the skies.
Silent he glares, austere, alone,
With sun-out-staring eyes.
IN THE LIGHTHOUSE AT POINT LOOKOUT, NORTH
CAROLINA
Note. — Point Lookout, one of the Capes along the coast, is
south of the dreaded Hatteras, and nearly opposite Beaufort.
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132 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Its lighthouse can be seen at times from Beaufort. Here the
coast is very dangerous, but not so dangerous as the Hatteras
bars.
Upon these dreary bars the ocean rolls.
Billow on billow and f orevermore !
Age, after age, with unremitting roar,
They curl and break and churn on sands and shoals.
What means that deep- voiced dolorous monotone!
Chants it a dirge o'er its unnumbered dead?
O'er empires that once flourished where its bed
Now slopes to depths unfathomed and unknown?
Or, haply, is't a monster's vicious tones,
Crouching to spring upon its prey, I hear —
Waiting to swallow up earth's mighty thrones,
And raise new worlds from its own gloomy sphere?
Or sobs, perchance, man's kingdoms to efface.
Only to whelm again some distant race?
A CHRISTMAS MEMORY
The hour is late, the fire is low,
And eery winds from northland's snow
Around the eaves are moaning;
A spirit roams the world to-night
From land to land, in silent flight,
As fast as flies the dawning.
The snow is tinkling through my blinds ;
The owls, hid in the hooded pines,
Their dolorous greetings render;
Back into other years I steal —
A child, at mother's knee I feel
That gracious hand and tender!
I hear — and how my bosom swells —
I hear the neighboring village bells,
Blent with the tempest's booming;
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HENRY JEROME STOCKARD 133
Out in the whirling snow I hear
The muffled tramp of nimble deer —
Old Santa Claus is coming!
The rockets mount with trails of fire
O'er roof and elm and lofty spire —
Up, up to skyward winging;
Thank God for Christmas! Man ne'er grows
So old but that he loves the snows,
And bells of Christmas ringing!
WASHINGTON
No chill benumbed his spirits when wintry skies
Above his tattered tents brooded so gray;
He saw not the dense wilderness that lay
Bound him, nor death that lurked in many a guise.
Beyond those years with clear, prophetic eyes
He gazed into the future far away,
And saw a puissant land whose perfect day
Lies veiled yet in the unborn centuries.
For this he faced the f oeman, and alas !
Felt what was far more keen than f oeman '& steel —
Such stings of calumy as never heal ; —
Nor ever once in his great soul dreamed he
That while the world's long generations pass
All tongues should name him Father of the Free !
SIR WALTER RALEIGH
Note. — Sir Walter Raleigh was the first English states-
man to attempt a settlement in America. His first expedition
landed on Roanoke Island. Here a fort called Fort Raleigh
was built. In 1792, the capital of the State was fixed and
named "Raleigh," in remembrance of "the citie of Raleigh,"
which was to have been established on Roanoke Island. In
1896 a memorial stone was erected on Roanoke Island to mark
the site where the old fort stood. Some years later when
there was a manifestation of interest in the erection in the
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134 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
capital city of the State of a monument to Sir Walter Raleigh,
this poem was read, by request, at a meeting of the State Liter-
ary and Historical Association.
He is not greatest who with pick and spade
Makes excavations for some splendid fane,
Nor he who lays with trowel, plumb, and line
Upon the eternal rock its base of stone ;
Nor is he greatest who lifts slow its walls,
Flutes its white pillars, runs its architrave
And frieze and cornice, sets its pictured panes,
And points its airy minarets with gold;
Nor he who peoples angle, niche, and aisle
With sculptured angels, and with symbol graves
Column and arch and nave and gallery;
These are but delvers, masons, artisans,
Each working out his part of that vast plan
Projected in the master builder's brain.
And he who wakes the organ's soulful tones
Faint far away, like those that haply steal, —
The first notes of the song of the redeemed
From out the spirit- world to dying ears ;
Or rouses it in lamentations wild
Of Calvary, or moves its inmost deeps
With sobs and cryings unassauged that touch
The heart to tears for unf orgiven sin : —
He voices but the echo of that hymn
Whose surges shook the greet composer's soul.
Bold admirals of the vast high seas of dream
With neither chart nor azimuth nor star,
That push your prows into the mighty trades
And ocean streams toward continents unknown;
Brave pioneers that slowly blaze your way
And set your cairns for peoples yet unborn
Upon imagination's dim frontiers, —
Ye are the makers, rulers of the world!
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HENRY JEROME STOCKARD 135
And so this splendid land to sunward laid,
With opulent fields and many a winding stream
And virgin wood, with stores of gems and veins
Of richest ore ; with mills and thronging marts,
The domain of the freest of the free, —
'Tis but the substance of his dream, — the pure,
The true, the generous knight who marked its bounds
With liberal hand by interfusing seas.
What though no sage may read the riddle dark
Of Crotan, diffused through marsh and waste
And solitude? Their valor did not die,
But is incorporate in our civic life.
They were of those who fought at Bannockburn ;
Their vital spirits spake at Mecklenburg ;
They rose at Alamance, at Bethel led,
And steered at Cardenas straight through blinding
shells ;
They live to-day, and shall forever live,
Lifting mankind toward freedom and toward God !
And he still lives, the courteous and the brave
Whose life went out in seeming dark defeat.
The Tower held not his princely spirit immured,
But in those narrow dungeon walls he trod
Kingdoms unlimited by earthly zones,
And from its dismal gates passed unafraid
To an inheritance beyond decay,
Stored in the love and gratitude of man.
He lives in our fair city, noble state,
Puissant land — in all each hopes to be I
He lives in noble words and splendid dreams,
In strenuous actions and in high careers,
An inspiration unto loftier things.
Upon the scheme of ages man shall find
Success oft failure, failure oft success,
When he shall read the record of the years !
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ROBERT STRANGE
The Author. — Robert strange was born in Virginia,
^September 20, 1756. He was educated at Hampden Sid-
ney College and then studied law. After being admitted
to the bar, he settled in Fayetteville, N. C, and in 1821
was elected to the General Assembly, where he served in
1822-1823 and 1826. He was elected in 1826 Judge of the
Superior Court, and held that place until 1836, when he
was elected to the United States Senate. He continued a
member of that body until 1840, when he resigned after
refusing to obey the instruction of the North Carolina
Legislature. On his return to Fayetteville he resumed
his profession, and subsequently was elected Solicitor of
the Fifth Judicial District. The degree of LL.D. was
conferred on him by Rutgers College in 1840.
Judge Strange wrote several poems. Ten of them are
published in Mary Bayard Clarke's "Wood Notes.' ' He
published also a novel entitled "Eoneguski; or, The Cher-
okee Chief, ,, in which he preserved many of the traditions
of the region in which he resided.
THE MUSIC OF THE HEART
There is a melody deep and abounding
'Mid the strangely wrought chords of the heart ;
The wind may not pass, but 'tis sounding
A music unrivaled by art.
At times 'tis the wailing of sorrow,
From the depths of its being it brings;
Again, wildest joy on the morrow
Comes bursting away from its strings.
The presence of each passing stranger
May draw from its tissue a tone ;
136
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ROBERT STRANGE 137
That too often, alas ! there is danger
May sound when that stranger is gone.
Not e'en from the light breath of fashion
It's music is wholly concealed;
But alone to the warm touch of passion
Will the heart its true melody yield.
To Love — Love alone, is given
Most exquisite music to make ;
Such tones as re-echoed from Heaven
The rapture of seraphs awake.
EARTH'S LULLABY TO HER CHILDREN
At morn my children all scamper away,
Their hearts full of hope and mirth, ,
To join with each other in life's wild play,
Forgetful of kind Mother Earth.
But hungry or thirsty they think of me,
And turn to me often and o'er;
While like a fond mother I open free
My breast to the children I bore.
And I nourish them there with fondest love
And give them the strength of my heart,
Till again they go forth and wildly rove,
Nor sigh from their mother to part.
All thoughtless of me, they pass the day,
In business, in love, or in war ;
Their senses absorbed in life's stirring play,
They fancy the evening afar*
But evening steals on with her twilight gloom,
And Earth's weary offspring must rest;
And one by one will my children come
To sleep on their kind mother's breast.
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FRANCES CHRISTINE FISHER TIERNAN
The Author. — Frances Christine Fisher Tiernan, the
daughter of Col. Chas. F. Fisher, was horn in Salisbury,
N. C, July 5, 1846. She received her early instruction
from a maiden aunt, Miss Christine Reid, and as soon as
she was old enough was sent to St. Mary's College, Ral-
eigh, North Carolina. But her education was completed
under the instruction of her aunt. In 1870 she pub-
lished her first novel, "A Question of Honor,' ' and it
is still one of her most widely known books. In 1871 she
published in Appleton's Journal a novel entitled "Morton
House,' ' a story of Southern life. This novel, Miss Tier-
nan considers her best since she gave to it her most care-
ful work. In 1887 she married James M. Tiernan, of
Maryland, and accompanied her husband to Mexico where
Mr. Tiernan had large mining interests. There she col-
lected material for her novel, "The Land of the Sun,"
and some Mexican stories, notably "The Pictures of Las
Cruces," which appeared in Lippincott's Magazine, and
was afterward translated into French and published in
L' Illustration of Paris. After her husband's death in
1898 Mrs. Tiernan made her home for a while in New
York City, but later returned to Salisbury, N. C, where
she now lives in the same house in which she was born.
She has published in all about twenty novels. One of
the best is "The Land of the Sky," the scene of which
is laid in Western North Carolina. Though she never
made the slightest claim whatever to being a poet, the few
verses she has written are worthy of reproduction. In
1909 Mrs. Tiernan was awarded the Laetare Medal by the
University of Notre Dame, Indiana. This medal is given
annually to some lay member of the Catholic Church for
distinguished services in literature, art, science, or phil-
osophy. This is the only instance when this medal has
been awarded to a Southerner. Mrs. Tiernan 's pen name
is "Christian Reid."
138
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FRANCES CHRISTINE FISHER TIERNAN 139
THE ALABAMA v
Note. — The Alabama was a war vessel owned by the Con-
federate government. It was built in England in 18^7. Dur-
ing the two years of her existence she captured sixty-six vessels.
In 1864 a celebrated battle was fought off the French coast be-
tween the Alabama and the federal Kearsarge, in which the
Alabama was sunk. Her master was the famous Admiral
Semmes. Every one who has ever read "Service Afloat" — and
every Southerner should read it — will remember how Admiral
Semmes cast his sword into the sea.
Far away in foreign waters
There was vengeance in the name,
And terror to the trader
In the ALABAMA'S fame:
Far beneath the Southern heavens,
And beneath the Northern stars,
Did she bear unblenched the honors
Of the Banner of the Bars !
Where the bright sea of the Tropics
Lay a sheen of burning gold,
Where the icebergs of the Arctics
Gleamed amid the frigid cold,
Where the coral islands clustered
In the purple Indian calm,
Where the Mexic mountains bore aloft
Their coronals of palm:
Where the Afric headlands towered
O'er the ocean's broad expanse,
Where the laughing southern waters kissed
The sunny plains of France,
Where'er a Union vessel
Spread her canvas to the breeze,
She did well to watch the coming
Of the Ranger of the Seas!
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140 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
She did well to read the warning
Of the wrecks upon her path,
Of the burning glow that lit the sky
In sudden sign of wrath:
She did well to reef her outspread sails
And yield the hopeless fight,
When the staunchest rover of the sea
Came bearing into sight!
Long as the Southern heart shall thrill
To deeds of deathless fame,
So long shall live, in tale and song,
The ALABAMAN name.
Long shall the story still be told
Of how she swept the seas,
And flung the starlight of our flag
To every ocean breeze!
And honored long the Lion Heart
That o'er her held command,
All honor to the dauntless breast
And ever fearless hand!
Thrice honored, too, the sword that rests
A thousand fathoms deep,
Where surges foam and waters —
And winds above it sweep !
Like a hero clad in armor,
True to the very last,
The ALABAMA died no death
That could disgrace her past!
The free child of the waters,
She sank beneath the wave,
And, with her flag still flying, found
An unpolluted grave.
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FRANCES CHRISTINE FISHER TIERNAN 141
REGRET
If I had known, loyal heart,
When hand to hand we said farewell,
How for all time our paths would part,
What shadow o'er our friendship fell,
I should have clasped your hand so close
In warm pressure of my own,
That memory still might keep its grasp,
If I had known.
If I had known, when far and wide
We loitered through the summer land,
What Presence wandered by our side,
And o'er you stretched its awful hand,
I should have hushed my careless speech,
To listen well to every tone
That from your lips fell low and sweet,
If I had known.
If I had known, when your kind eyes
Met mine in parting, true and sad —
Eyes gravely tender, gently wise,
And earnest rather more than glad —
How soon the lids would lie above,
As cold and white as sculptured stone,
I should have treasured every glance,
If I had known.
If I had known, from the strife
Of fears, hopes, passions here below,
Unto a purer, higher life,
That you were called, friend, to go,
I should have stayed all foolish tears,
And hushed each idle sigh and moan,
To bid you a last, long God-speed,
If I had known.
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142 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
If I had known to what strange place,
What mystic, distant, silent shore,
You calmly turned your steadfast face,
What time your foosteps left my door,
I should have forged a golden link
To bind the heart, so constant grown,
And keep it constant ever there,
If I had known.
If I had known that, until death
Shall with his finger touch my brow
And still the quickening of the breath
That stirs with life's full meaning now,
So long my feet must tread the way
Of our accustomed paths alone,
I should have prized your presence more,
If I had known.
-If I had known how soon for you
Drew near the ending of the fight,
And on your vision, fair and new,
Eternal peace dawned into sight,
I should have begged, as love's last gift,
That you, before God's great white throne,
Would pray for your poor friend on earth,
If I had known.
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UNKNOWN
SWANNANOA
Note. — The authorship of this poem is unknown. There is
satisfactory evidence that it is not the work of Mrs. Mary
Bayard Clarke, or Calvin H. Wiley, or Philo Henderson, to each
of whom it has been accredited. The only known claim to its
authorship was made anonymously in 1873 by a resident of
Charleston, S. C, who was editor of a Southern magazine.
The poem was written prior to 1864, at which time it had al-
ready become well known. The Swannanoa is a tributary
of the French Broad and was named by the Indians "The
Beautiful." Note the following rivers it is compared with:
Ashley of South Carolina, Hudson of New York, Susquehanna
of Pennsylvania, Scioto of Ohio, and Juaniata of Pennsylvania.
Swannanoa, nymph of beauty,
I would woo thee in my rhyme,
Wildest, brightest, loveliest river
Of our sunny Southern clime !
Swannanoa, well they named thee,
In the mellow Indian tongue ;
Beautiful thou art, most truly,
And right worthy to be sung.
I have stood by many a river,
Known to story and to song —
Ashley, Hudson, Susquehanna,
Fame to which may well belong ; —
I have camp'd by the Ohio,
Trod Scioto's fertile banks,
Follow 'd far the Juaniata,
In the wildest of her pranks, —
But thou reignest queen for ever,
Child of Appalachian hills,
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144 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Winning tribute as thou flowest,
From a thousand mountain-rills.
Thine is beauty, strength-begotten,
Mid the cloud-begirded peaks,
Where the patriarch of the mountains,
Heav'nward for thy waters seeks.
Through the laurels and the beeches,
Bright thy silvery current shines,
Sleeping now in granite basins,
Overhung by trailing vines,
And anon careering onward,
In the maddest frolic-mood,
Waking, with thy sea-like voices,
Fairy echoes in the wood.
Peaceful sleep thy narrow valleys,
In the shadow of the hills,
And thy flower-enamelled border,
All the air with fragrance fills.
Wild luxuriance, generous tillage,
Here alternate meet the view,
Every turn, through all thy windings
Still revealing something new.
Where, graceful Swannanoa,
Are the warriors who of old
Sought thee at thy mountain sources,
Where thy springs are icy cold —
Where the dark-browed Indian maidens,
Who their limbs were wont to lave
(Worthy bath for fairer beauty)
In thy cool and limpid wave?
Gone forever from thy borders,
But immortal in thy name,
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UNKNOWN 145
Are the red men of the forest;
Be thou keeper of their fame !
Paler races dwell beside thee;
Celt and Saxon till thy lands,
Wedding use unto thy beauty —
Linking over thee their hands.
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ROBERT BRANK VANCE
The Author. — Robert Brank Vance, son of David Vance
and Mira Margaret Baird, was born in Buncombe Coun-
ty, April 24, 1828. His youngest brother was the distin-
guished Zebulon Baird Vance. At twenty years of age
he was elected clerk of court of common pleas and quar-
ter session of Buncombe County and served in that
capacity for eight years. On retiring from this office he
engaged in merchandising at Asheville. But when the
war between the states broke out, he organized a com-
pany of soldiers and was unanimously elected colonel.
He served in Tennessee, and was promoted to the rank
of brigadier-general on account of his distinguished serv-
ices at Cumberland Gap, Murfreesboro and other battles
of East Tennessee. In one of his attempts to cross Smoky
Mountains and aid General Longstreet he was captured
by the enemy and confined first at Camp Chase and later
at Port Delaware. On March 14, 1865, he was paroled
and came South.
In 1872 he was elected to represent his district in Con-
gress, and he continued its representative for twelve years.
In 1884 President Cleveland appointed him assistant com-
missioner of patents. He was an active member of the
Methodist Church and was several times elected to the
General Conference.
General Vance wrote a great deal for the press. Many
of his verses were collected and published in a little vol-
ume entitled "Heart-Throbs Prom the Mountains/ ' from
which volume this selection is made.
General Vance was twice married, first to Miss Harriet
V. McElroy, and later to Miss Lizzie R. Cook. He died
November 28, 1899.
146
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ROBERT BRANK VANCE 147
DR. MITCHELL'S GRAVE
Note. — Dr. Elisha Mitchell, a distinguished professor of the
University of North Carolina, lost his life, June 27, 1857, while
exploring one of the mountain peaks of Western North Caro-
lina. He was buried on the summit of the mountain where a
monument later was erected to his memory. The mountain
was named Mitchell's Peak in his honor.
On the highest peak of a mighty chain
Of hill and mountain fastness,
Where nature doth her primal rule maintain
Amid their solemn vastness,
There's a lonely grave that the mountain gave,
Which the sorrowing moonbeams gently lave.
No echoing sound of the city's hum
Shall reach the peaceful sleeper;
No note of joy or grief to him shall come
Prom plow-boy or from reaper;
But silent he'll sleep, while the ivies creep,
And the angels their sacred vigils keep.
The deafening peals of the thunder's voice
Shall never break his dreaming,
Though the tempests wild in their might rejoice
Amid the lightning's gleaming;
His rest still is deep on the mountain steep,
Though his pupils mourn and his loved ones weep.
The tremulous trills of the mother bird,
As she sings her songs so lowly,
Though a sweeter tone the ear never heard,
Touch not a rest so holy ;
For God keeps him there, in the upper air,
Sleeping and waiting for the morning fair.
The clustering blooms of the flowerets wild,
Their fragrance sweet distilling,
Though ever himself kind nature's fond child,
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148 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Breaks not the tryst he's filling;
For God knows so swell the spot where he fell
That nothing but Heaven can unlock the spell.
The summer and autumn, they come and go,
Old winter oft-times lingers,
And spring rhododendrons after the snow
Lift up their beautiful fingers;
But changes may sweep over the land and the deep,
Yet nothing disturbs his satisfied sleep.
In Alma Mater's halls voices and tears
May speak the heart's deep yearning,
And oft to the eye Mount Mitchell appears
When fancy's lights are burning;
But the tolling bell and its mournful knell
Shall bring him no more, for he resteth well.
But a morn shall come, glorious morn !
When the trumpet's shrill sounding
Shall reach every soul that ever was born,
And life anew be bounding;
And God in His might, from the mountain height,
Shall wake His servant to the wondrous sight.
THE MOUNTAIN CROSS
Note. — Just after the traveler passes the celebrated Painted
Rock, at the border of North Carolina and Tennessee, he will
find the train passing between two stupendous mountains, the
French Broad River between the two. Standing on the rear
platform, he will see, near the top of the mountain, what ap-
pears to be a great white cross, which, according to the author
of this poem, seems a way-mark for heaven.
As down the dashing river
The travler speeds his way,
He sees upon the mountain
Above him far away,
Just where the rock is riven
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ROBERT BRANK VANCE 149
By the bursting of a flood,
On that awful height, a cross, snow-white,
To point his soul to God.
Down there the boiling waters
Arise, and foam, and swell,
And in a voice of thunder
They startle all the dell ;
But high above the rushing,
Just near the peaceful sky,
That most holy sign of a love divine
Swells out to greet the eye.
And while the eye is gazing
Upon that sign so sweet,
He forgets the rushing river
Where the mad waters meet ;
And his soul is filled with gladness
That in his mountain land,
With a matchless grace, for the human race,
The Lord holds out His hand.
I love thee, racing river,
I love each lofty crag;
I love the mighty mountains,
The home of the fleet stag;
But dearer to my vision,
And sweeter to my heart,
Is the land of the leal, so dear, so real,
Where loved ones never part.
Roll on, thou rushing river!
Stand up, ye mountains tall!
And rock, and hill, and canon
Grace well this earthly ball;
And white cross on the mountain,
Stand out on the high peak,
And with thy true hand point to the sweet land
Which trav'lers all should seek!
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OEORGE MORDECAI WHITING
The Author. — George M. Whiting was born in Raleigh,
N. C, February 9, 1842, and served in the Confederate
Army as captain of Company C, Twenty-seventh North
Carolina Regiment. He was wounded and captured at
the Battle of Gettysburg, and later confined in the mili-
tary prison on Johnson's Island, N. Y., where he con-
tracted consumption from which he died a few years af-
ter the war on his twenty-eighth birthday, February 9,
1870. The verses given below were inscribed on the
Confederate Monument erected in Oakwood Cemetery at
Raleigh in 1870. Captain Whiting was the son of Sey-
mour W. Whiting, author of the poem " Alamance,' ' else-
where given in this work.
WARRIOR, SLEEP!
Sleep! warrior, sleep! the struggle,
The battle-cry, is hushed;
Our standards have been lowered,
Our blooming hopes been crushed.
Sleep ! for thy name is cherished
By the bravest and the best;
And soldiers' hearts and woman's love
Are with thee in thy rest.
150
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SEYMOUR WEBSTER WHITING
The Author. — Seymour W. Whiting, a descendant of the
old Whiting and Bradford families of Massachusetts, and
the author of Alamance and other poems, was born in
Stratford, Conn., in 1817. He moved to Raleigh, N. C., at
the age of nineteen. He showed unusual ability at a very
early age, and after the old Raleigh and Gaston Railroad
was built he become its treasurer under the presidency of
George W. Mordecai. He was also associated with Mr.
Mordecai in the management of the old state bank. He
married Miss Hannah Stewart, of Raleigh. Although he
died, January 2, 1855, at the early age of thirty-eight, his
business career and literary works left him fame.
ALAMANCE
Note. — The battle of Alamance was fought, May 16, 1771,
between an organized force known as the "Regulators' 1 and the
troops of the colony under the leadership of Governor Tryon.
The trouble arose over the unjust method of collecting taxes.
The scene of the battle is located in Alamance County. The
"Regulators" were defeated, but they put an end to the unjust
practices of the King's officer. A monument was erected on
the old battlefield in 1880.
No stately column marks the hallowed place
Where silent sleeps, unurn'd, their sacred dust —
The first free martyrs of a glorious race,
Their fame a people's wealth, a nation's trust.
The rustic ploughman, at the early morn,
The yielding furrow turns with heedless tread,
Or tends with frugal care the springing corn
Where tyrants conquer M and where heroes bled.
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152 NORTH CAROLINA POEMS
Above their rest the golden harvest waves,
The glorious stars stand sentinel on high ;
While in sad requiem near their turfless graves
The winding river murmurs mourning by.
No stern ambition nerved them to the deed,
In Freedom's cause they nobly dared to die;
The first to conquer, or the first to bleed,
God, and their country's right, their battle-cry.
But holier watchers here their vigils keep,
Than storied urn or monumental stone ;
For Law and Justice guard their dreamless sleep,
And Plenty smiles above their bloody home.
Immortal youth shall crown their deathless fame,
And, as their country's glories still advance,
Shall brighter blaze o'er all the earth thy name,
The first-fought field of Freedom — Alamance.
SONG OF SPRING
I come ! I come ! ye have looked for me long,
Ye meet me with laughter, and greet me with song;
Bright eyes are beaming with gladness and mirth,
Soon shall their brightness be dim upon earth.
Ye are changed ! Ye are changed ! since I met with you
last,
And a blight o 'er the bloom of your spirits hath passed ;
Ye have given the rose for the lily's pale breath;
Bright ones of earth! ye have loked upon death.
I return with the pale delicate flowers,
And the birds that have wandered far over the sea ;
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SEYMOUR WEBSTER WHITING 153
But I bring not the loved and the lost to your bowers ;
They have faded from earth, and return not with me.
Where are the gentle, the lovely, the fair,
Whose clustering locks were untouched by care?
The laughing eye in whose radiance lay
No shadowy semblance of dull decay?
They are gone ! they are gone with the parted year,
Ye have strewn pale flowers on the lowly bier.
Farewell ! for I haste on my gossamer wing,
And the loved ones ye mourn for return not with spring.
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SITE M. WHITAKER
The Author. — Miss Sue M. Whitaker, formerly a teach-
er, is a native of Halifax County, N. C. Her father, Rev.
G. A. T. Whitaker, was a minister of the Methodist Prot-
estant faith. He served charges and did missionary work
in many counties of North and South Carolina, the chil-
dren receiving their education in schools wherever the
family happened to be located. Misses Sue and Mattie
Whitaker, sisters, now live in Raleigh, which has been
their home since 1898. The first named has written a
number of short poems of merit. The one here given was
first published in the Charlotte Observer about eight years
ago. Its true poetic note caught the attention of many
readers in North Carolina and other States. One of these,
himself a distinguished writer, referred to " Finis' ' as
1 'one of the finest poems we have ever read," declaring
that "it is a poem, although it has but three verses, for it
conveys its idea complete."
FINIS
What, here so soon?
Sunset and night?
Why, I have work to do that needs the noon
And day's broad light!
See ! On the palette, there, the colors are but set,
The canvas still unwet
And it is night !
How shall it rise —
That heavenly strain —
On heavenly wings, to woo the listening skies
To earth again f
While lies the violin here, untouched, unstrung;
Its sweetest song unsung
And it is night !
• 154
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SUE M. WHITAKER 155
How sweet 'twould be —
My work all done —
To sit at eve, my threshold on, and see
Stars, one by one,
Flash into the dark Heaven. Oh, happy rest !
My folded hands, how blest
But — 'tis already night!
THE END
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INDEX.
A Christmas Memory (Stock-
ard), 132
A Christmas Prayer (Spence),
120
A Greeting to Grandfather
Mountain (Dickson), 32
A Jolly Old Man (Cade), 20
Alamance (Whiting), 151
Appomattox (Note), 129
A Prayer (Dickson), 34
Armfield, Lucile (Quoted), v
A Song of Autumn (Lyle), 92
A Song of the Road (Lyle), 95
At Sea (McNeill), 103
Away Down Home (McNeill),
98
Aycock, Charles Brantley
(Note), 37
Beauty or Power (Spence),
121
Blackboard the Corsair (Hay-
wood), 72
Boner, John Henry, 5
Brimley, Herbert Hutchinson,
12
Cade, Baylus, 18
Cape Hatteras (Note), 83
Caribee (Note), 84
Carolina, Our Pride (Harring-
ton), 62
Chancellorsville ( Gillespie ) ,
54
Christian Reid, 138
Clarke, Mary Bayard, 23
157
Clingman, Nixon Poindexter,
28
Contents, xi
Curtis, Mrs. A. W. (Quoted),
vi
Dan River (Note), 104
Dare, Virginia (Note), 118
Dickson, Sallie O. H., 32
Do We Forget? (Dickson), 33
Dr. Mitchell's Grave (Vance),
147
Durham, Plato Tracy, 35
Earth's Lullaby to 3er Chil-
dren (Strange), 137
Editor's Preface, ix
Ellenwood, H. S., 39
Eventide (Gillespie), 55
Finis (Whitaker), 154
Fordham (Note), 10
French Broad River (Note),
26
Fuller, Edwin Wiley, 41
Gaston, Alexander F., 45
Gaston, William, 46
Gee, Pattie Williams, 48
Gillespie, Joseph H., 52
God's Love (Gee), 51
Grandfather Mountain (Note),
32
Greaves, Charles Luther, 56
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158
INDEX
Harrell, William Bernard, 60
Harrington, Thomas Watts, 62
Hatteras (Holden), 82
Haywood, Marshall DeLancey,
69
He Came and Went (Rock-
well), 109
Hecla (Note), 82, 83
Hill, Theophilns Hunter, 76
Ho! For Carolina! (Harrell),
60
Holden, Joseph William, 82
Hunting Muscadines (Boner),
6
Indian Names (Spencer), 127
In Memoriam (Clingman), 28
In the Lighthouse at Point
Lookout (Stockard), 131
Introduction, 1
Johnny's Story (Lindesay), 91
Lee's Statue (Note), 36
Lehman, Emma A., 86
Life's Victors (Lyle), 96
Lindesay, Marie Batterham,
89
Lines to the Ladies' Memorial
Association of Wilmington
(Fuller), 42
Lines to the Old North State
(Clarke), 23
Lumber River (Note), 101
Lyle, Samuel Harley, Jr., 92
Macon, Nathaniel (Note), 114
Marriage of the Sun and Moon
(Ellen wood), 39
Mater Mea, Carolina (Gee),
48
McNeill, John Charles, 97
Milk-White Doe, the Vision of
(Sledd), 118
Minstrels of the Pasquotank
(Greaves), 57
Moore's Creek Bridge, Battle
of (Note), 69
Morehead, Abraham Forest,
104
Morn and Eve (Lyle), 92
M. W. Ransom (McNeill), 99
Night (Rockwell), 108
North Carolina to Charles B.
Aycock (Durham), 37
October (McNeill), 100
Painted Rock (Note), 148
Paper-Folks (Spence), 122
Peace (Lindesay), 90
Pettigrew, James Johnston
(Note), 43
Pilot Mountain (Note), 111
Poe's Cottage at Fordham
(Boner), 10
Point Lookout (Note), 131
Queen Flora's Opening Day
(Lehman), 86
Racing Water (Clarke), 26
Randolph, John (Note), 113
Regret (Tiernan), 141
Roanoke (Shepard), 113
Roanoke River (Note), 113
Rockwell, James Chester, vii,
108
Royal Shoal (Note), 16
She is My Queen (Rockwell),
110
Shepard, James Biddle, 111
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INDEX
159
Sir Walter Raleigh (Stock-
ard), 133
Sledd, Benjamin, 115
Song (Lindesay), 89
Song of Spring (Whiting), 152
Song of the Butterfly (Hill),
76
Spence, Hersey Everett, 120
Spencer, Cornelia Phillips, 125
Stanzas (Gillespie), 52
Stockard, Henry Jerome, 129
Strange, Robert, 136
Sunburnt Boys (McNeill), 101
Swannanoa (Unknown), 143
The Alabama (Tiernan), 139
The Bells of Heaven (Fuller),
44
The Bells of Trinity (Dur-
ham), 35
The Children (Sledd), 115
The Dream of Lee and Lin-
coln (Durham), 36
The Eagle (Stockard), 131
The Flint-Lock Rifle (Hay-
wood), 69
The Gander (Harrington), 65
The Garden of Death (Dur-
ham), 38
The Genius of Dan (More-
head), 105
The Hills of Dan (Morehead),
104
The Last Charge at Appomat-
tox (Stockard), 129
The Light'ood Fire (Boner), 5
The Mammoth (Brimley), 12
The Moon-Loved Land (Bo-
ner), 9
The Mountain Cross (Vance),
148
The Music of the Heart
(Strange), 136
The Mystery of the Woods
(Sledd), 116
The Old North State (Gas-
ton), 46
The Open Fire (McNeill), 102
The Pilot (Shepard), 111
The Poet's Story (Rockwell),
109
The Royal Terns of Royal
Shoal (Brimley), 16
The Shout of a King (Greaves),
58
The Snow (Lehman), 88
The Song of the Buccaneer
(Lyle), 93
The Star Above the Manger
(Hill), 79
The Sunbeam (Hill), 78
The Sunflower (Fuller), 43
The University's Centennial
(Spencer), 126
The "Valley and Shadow"
(Gillespie), 53
The Vision of the Milk-White
Doe (Sledd), 118
The Volunteers (Gaston), 45
The Wanderer Back Home
(Boner), 7
The Wolf (Boner), 8
The Wraith o f Roanoke
(Sledd), 119
Tiernan, Frances Fisher, 138
'Tis Springtime in the Wood-
lands (Brimley), 14
To a Mocking-Bird (Harring-
ton), 68
To a Snow-Bird (Greaves), 56
To a Wood -Lark (Harring-
ton), 67
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160
INDEX
Under the Pines (Fuller), 41
United (Sledd), 117
Unknown, 143
Vance, Robert Brank, 146
Virginia Dare (Note), 118
Waiting (Cade), 18
Warrior, Sleep! (Whiting),
150
Washington (Stockard), 133
What is Worth While? (Linde-
say), 91
Where Fairies Play (Lyle), 94
Whitaker, Sue M., 154
Whiting, George Mordecai,
150
Whiting, Seymour Webster,
151
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THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
RBFBRBNGB DEPARTMENT
This book is under no circumstances to be
taken from the Building
m OCT I 9 1?
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